The parish of Colinton : from an early period to the present day

M.L-

941.445019

G696S

1320178

GENEALOGY COLLECTION

ALLEN COUNTY PUBLIC LIBRARY

3 1833 00674 8682

THE

pflHiSH OF GOiiijlTOH

FROM

An Early Period to the Present Day,

BY

DAVID SHANKIE.

EDINBURGH:

PRINTED BY JOHN WILSON,

104 High Street.

1902.

1320178

\3

l.tt>y

^'y^'^'^ ''^^^^J^^

Cop// of Fird l\uje Kirk Session lleconh,
Dated 7th September 1051.

YE BUKE

OF YE

PAROCHE & KIRK

OF

HAILES

ALIAS

COLLINGTOUNE.

DEDICATION.

To the REV. NORMAN C. MAGFARLANE,

Free Church Manse,

JUNIPER GREEN.

Much Respected Sir,

Although I never mentioned the subject in
any former letter I have had the honour of addressing
to you, it has long been my intention to give you a
brief sketch, or might I say miniature history of the
Parish in which you have the honour to be a minister of
the Gospel, and in which I have every reason to suppose
you are deeply interested. Conscious, however, of my
own limited capacity for the compilation of such a
sketch, I thought it expedient not to mention its
existence until the task had been in a manner completed.

The following pages were written in the interval of
other avocations, and having found much enjoyment in
the compilation, I have much pleasure in giving the
result to you in the hope that they may be a source of
instruction and amusement in an idle hour.

You will observe that an attempt has been made to
give a general view of the Parish history with a selec-
tion of what may be its more picturesque and prominent
features.

And now my friendly Aristarchus, I have made my
bow, and would commend you to the perusal of the
following small, though it is to be hoped, not uninterest-
ing selection of facts. I feel no anxiety in presenting
them to you, as yours has always been a friendly if not
an indulgent criticism.

Yours very respectfully,

D. S.

PREFACE.

It is the object of this little volume, now offered to
those interested, to supply them with a compilation
and record of most of the Parish Lore that can be
gathered together in connection with the Parish of
Colinton.

It Avas intended at first only to issue a few of the
sketches in leaflet form, but after careful revision and
making numerous additions, it is now published in its
proper character as an abridged History of the Parish,
not without the hope that many may find in it some
of the interest and pleasure which its Author has
experienced in the study of these old-world ways as
they existed at Colinton.

Such stories of olden times, especially in small com-
munities, affords us an admirable insight into the
manners, customs and social condition of the Scotch
people, and help to convey an idea of how valuable
the old Parish Records are. These documents have,
for the first time, been made use of in the present
work, and have been extracted from copiously.

During the progress of the History, the compiler
has had to consult publications in public and private
libraries, and has been indebted for information kindly
communicated by friends, his gratitude for which is
hereby acknowledged.

(fl^i)a:\;rtev I.

GENERALITIES.

" Away with these I True wisdom's world will be
Within its own creation, or in thine,

Maternal nature ! for who teems like thee,

*****

A blending of all beauties, streams and dells.
Fruit, foliage, crag, wood, cornfield, mountain,
And chiefless castles breathing stern farewells
From grey but leafy walls, where ruin greenly dwells."
Childe Harold's Pilfjrimage, Canto III.

HE Parish of Colinton, as you are
aware, is situated in the centre of
the County of Edinburgh, lying along
I the north side of the Pentland Hills
from their eastern extremity to about five miles
westward. Looking at the *Map you will observe
that the boundaries of the Parish are very regular,
in fact almost round. Its greatest length is 3|
miles and the greatest breadth is 3^ miles, occupy-
ing a space of about 5659f acres, of which 204-
acres are water. It is bounded on the south by the
A

2 HISTORY OF COLINTON PARISH.

Parish of Glencorse, on the north by Corstorphine,
on the west by Currie, and on the east by the
Parishes of Edinburgh and Liberton.

The surface of the parish is very irregular,
rushing steeply down from the hillside to the
bed of the Water of Leith, but everywhere ex-
hibiting a landscape so picturesque that can
hardly be surpassed. From Cape-Law the most
elevated point in the parish (1,595 feet) we
command a most magnificent view. Looking
down upon the lovely enclosure of Bonaly with
its peel tower nestling close under the shadow of
the white hill, away across the plain, Edinburgh,
the most picturesque city in the world, lying
peaceful and grand encircled by the hills of
Corstorphine, Craiglockhart, Blackford, Braids and
Arthur Seat. The bright blue Firth of Forth
carrying along its scattered burden of white
sails, from the windings, broadening out to the
east until it is lost in the hazy distance. While
the white-washed towns and sunny line of the
Fife coast and the lofty heights of the Grampians
with their usually snowy helmets towering beyond
the Ochils form a charming background to the
landscape at our feet.

From some of the low heads of the hills here
also, the view is described by Grecian Williams
to be exactly that of the vicinity of Athens, as
seen from the base of mount Anchesimus, "close

GENERALITIES. 3

upon the right Brilessus is represented by the
hill of Braids, before us in the dark and abrupt
mass of the Castle rises the Acropolis : the hill
of Lycabettus joined to that of Areopagus, appears
the Oalton : in the Firth of Forth we behold the
iEgean Sea : in Inchkeith, iEgina : and the hills
of the Pelopomesus are precisely those of the
opposite coast of Fife."

Looking upon such glorious views as we behold
from these eminences, Scotsman may well adopt
the words of their famous bard : —

" Breathes there the man, with soul so dead,
Who never to himself hath said.

This is my own, my native land !
Whose heai't hath ne'er within hiin burned,
As home his footsteps he hath turn'd,

From wandering on a foreign strand ;
If such there breathe, go, mark him well ;
For him no minstrel's raptures swell ;
High though his titles, proud his name,
Boundless his wealth as wish can claim ;
Despite those titles, power and pelf,
The wretch, concentered all in self,
Living, shall forfeit fair renown,
And doubly dying, shall go down
To the vile dust from whence he sprung,
Unwept, unhonoured, and unsung."

Lay of the Last Minstrel.

The name of the parish has, curious to say,
undergone many changes. In the sixteenth

4 HISTORY OF COLINTON PARISH.

century we find it called Hailes and spelt in
many diflferent ways. The word is perhaps from
the Celtic signifying " hilly," the name is still
retained in the parish by the well-known quarry
and also a mansion house, both of which I shall
have occasion to mention further on.

Although the " new statistical account " states
that the name Hailes was given to the parish as
a compliment to the principal family, this how-
ever is most improbable as there is no record of
any of the principal families bearing the name.
About the year 1697 it began to be called alias
" Collingtown " then " Collingtoun " alias " Hailes."
The word " Collingtown " may also be derived
from the Celtic, " Coll " meaning wood or w^oody,
a wooded town, or a village in the wood. Be
that as it may, no explanation can be given for
the change, the Laird of Collingtoun or the parish
village of Collingtoun may have had something
to do with it. This name, however, has been
continually deliquated until in 1757 it appears
as Colinton which was finally settled upon.

Most of the parish down to the seventeenth
century seems to have been a desolate moor. The
lauds are now however, in a high state of culti-
vation, the soil ranges in character from good
alluvium through several sorts of loam to moorish
earth, about ^j of the entire area are arable,
with nearly one fourth of hill pasture. The

GENERALITIES. 5

rocks of the Pentlands are principally porphrites,
those of the low ground largely calciferous sand-
stone. Great improvement is shown in the lands
being dotted all over with numerous villas and
gentlemen's seats, each within its own environs
and says the " Agricultural Survey of Midlothian,"
" These add still more to the embellishment of
the scene from the manner in which they are
disposed, not in extended and thick plantations
which turn a county into a forest and throws a
gloom upon the prospect, but in clear and diversi-
fied lines, in clumps and hedgerows, useful as well
as ornamental, protecting not injuring cultivation.
. . . Descending from the hills to the low
country, the surface which had the appearance
of a uniform plain undergoes a change remark-
able to the eye. The fields are laid out in
various directions according to the nature of the
ground, which is unequal, irregular and inclined
to every point of the compass. The most part,
however, lies upon a gentle slope, either to the
north, or to the south, in banks which are ex-
tended from east to west over all the country.
This inequality in the surface contributes much
to the ornament of the view, by the agreeable
relief which the eye ever meets with in the
change of objects ; while the universal declivity
which prevails more or less in every field is
favourable to the culture of the lands, by allow-

6 HISTORY OF COLINTON PARISH.

ing a ready descent to the water which falls from
the heavens."

To the parish may, with a slight change, be
applied those words of Shakespeare : —

" The climate's delicate, the air most sweet,
Fertile the vale, the hills indeed surj^assing
The common praise they bear."

In the south-west corner of the parish lie the
Edinburgh and District Water Trust's Compensa-
tion Ponds, Bonaly, Clubbiedean. The triangular
TordufF (3 X f furlongs) the lowest of the three
and occupies the site of what was once a most
delightful valley. Lords Cockburn and Jeffrey
tried to prove that this was the real Habbies
Howe. Out of this reservoir flows the burn of
Braid, which runs 3| miles northward from
Bonaly into Edinburgh and joined near Dreghorn
Castle by the Howden Burn. Through the north-
west interior from Juniper to Longstone, the
Water of Leith winds 3 miles east-north-eastward
through lovely wooded dells. Other streamlets
are the Lothian Burn, and the Murray Burn, the
latter of which runs for some miles along the
northern boundary. The water of all these
streams is copious and excellent. We of course
must include the Water of Leith, and being the
principal stream requires special mention. We
certainly cannot speak of its " silver current " for

GENERALITIES, 7

that never was the colour of the water, being of
a rich amber brown. In fact, it is more often
termed in these days " that dirty Water of Leith,"
" tliat open sewer," and so on, but since the
Purification Bill has been put into operation, the
old tint may often be seen unless when some of
the mills chooses to lay their ugly hands upon it.
In olden times great weight has been borne to
the peculiar virtue, purity and efficacy of its
water. Mr. Geddie in his " Water of Leith from
Source to Sea " writes " What greater compliment
could be paid to a stream by a statute than that
contained in an Act of the Scottish Parliament
in 1617, appointing commissioners to see, among
other matters, that the standard 'Stirling pint jug'
contains ' three pounds seven ounces troy of clear
running water from the Water of Leith.' " Other
Acts of James the Sixth's reign are directed
against those who, by illegal engines such as
" cruves and zaives " were wont to cause great
" slauchter of the reid fische, smolts and frye of
all fishes," that in these days swarmed in the
river. Then again when in 1498 the pest known
by the name of the " wame ill " or the " land ill "
lay heavy on the valley, and more especially on
" the parochin of Curry and the parochin of
Hailles," the Town Council of Edinburgh, enacted
that none of the dwellei's in the infected districts
should come themselves or send goods within the

« HISTORY OF COLTNTON PARISH.

bounds of the Burgh, on pain of having their
cheeks burned with " ane hett yrne " directed
that the houses wherein the pest had been, should
be purified by " fyring them with bather, and
their chattels cleansed in the rynnand Water of
Leith," not the first or the last of the foul tasks
which this " serviceable drudge has been made «
to perform."

The industry of the people in the earlier times
must have been even of a more vai'ied description
than at present, the burns of the parish being
dotted all along with numerous little mills all
jogging along quietly preparing their various
commodities, and as tradition runs ; " the master
miller would drive his week's ' make ' to Edin-
burgh every Wednesday and come home from
town in the bottom of his cart." The principal
industry seems to have been that of waulking,
this was the last process through which cloth
had to go before being put upon the market, by
damping and beatling it when it came from the
hand-loom, which was another employment for a
number of the parishioners, (the last hand -loom
suddenly stopped 60 years ago). The snuff mills
which ground the " taddy " for the noses of our
great-grandfathers also employed a number of
people. Paper-making dates back to the days of
hand-made paper for which the parish was famous.
The first bank-notes manufactured in Scotland

GENERALITIES. 9

were made at Boag's mill near Slateford, for the
safety of which, some one tells us, a piequet of
soldiers were stationed there. Amonoj other in-
dustries were the flour mills, the flax beating
mill, the distillery, the skinnery and so on. The
paper-making is certainly the principal employ-
ment at present, white and brown paper, and
cardboard being turned out in large quantities.
The white dusky looking walls and windows of
the older mills also indicate that they are still
dedicated to meal and barley milling. From
others came wafted on the breeze a breath as
from the spicy east, indicating the preparation of
pepper, ginger, curry and cinnamon. Other indus-
tries which may be mentioned are the quarries,
the cleaning and dye works of which I will have
occasion to treat further on.

The valuation of the parish in 1844-45, the
first year of the compulsory assessment, was
£13,433 ; this year viz., 1900-01 the valuation, is
£45,591, including £7,945 for railways and water-
works, being an average increase of about £545
yearly.

The following are a few figures showing the
population of the parish: — in 1650 it amounted
to about 650 ; in 1800, 1397 ; 1831, 2232 ; 1861,
2656 ; 1871, 3644 ; 1881, 4347 ; 1891, 4.549 ; and
at the present census of 1901, 5499.

Qli^apt^v II.

VILLAGES.

" How often have I ijaused on every charm,
The sheltered cot, the cultivated farm,
The never-failing brook, the busy mill.
The decent church that tipp'd the neighbouring hill ;
The hawthorn bush with seats beneath the shade.
For talking age and Avhispering lovers made."

Goldsmith.

I ROM the Records of the Kirk-Session,
the Session Clerk beino- then a kind
of parish historian, and in whom I
put unbounded trust, as they were
all " honest men."* The different villages of the
parish in the beginning of the seventeenth century,
seems to have been Collingtoun, Sclaitfurd, Bon-
ailie, Badds, Hailes, and Swanstoun.

* "Mail : 15 : 1G87.

Sessione mett, all pnt. except David Denholm being

sick. Inter alia.

Electicm of five This day also 5 honest men were

honest incu to nominated from ye pulpite to be joined

the Elder.slap. to ye Eldership, viz. : — George Davie,

James Yourstone, James Laidly, William

Denholm, and Patrick Anderson."

VII^LAGES. 11

The village of Collingtoun, now Colinton, is of
the remotest antiquity, and from it most probably
the parish has derived its name. Sir Walter Scott,
writing in his " Tales of a Grandfather ," says
that in 1650 " the English army made a circuit
from the coast proceeding inland to Colinton,
Redhall, and other places near the eastern extre-
mity of the Pentland hills, from which Cromwell
hoped to advance on Edinburgh. But Leslie was
immediately on his guard. He left his position
betwixt Edinburgh and Leith, and one which
covered the City to the westward, and was pro-
tected by the Water of Leith and the several cuts,
drains, and mill leads of Saughton, Coltbridge, and
the houses and villages in that quarter. Here
Cromwell again found the Scots in order of battle,
and again was obliged to withdraw after a distant
cannonade."

During this time the village of Colinton was
occupied by ten companies of Monk's regiment,
under the command of Lieutenant Colonel Gough

Also in "Anno : 1689 : Feby. 24.
Sessione mett, inter alia.
Six honest and After sermon six honest men were

qualified men, tryed and found qualified for ye Elder-
nominated and ship, viz. : — Edward Brunttoune (Burton)
tryed in order David Denholm, James Davie, James
to ye eldership. Laidley, Will. Denholm and John
Brown."

12 HISTORY OF COLINTON PARISH.

of Berwick, and on the 24th and 25th of Ausfust
1650, they stormed and burned to the ground the
Fortalices of Colinton and Redhall.

Again in November of 1666, the village was
occupied this time by the covenanting army, under
the command of "two officers of low rank," Wallace
and Learmont. There is a vivid picture given us
by Sir James Turner, of the night spent in Colin-
ton — Sir James being a prisoner in the hand of the
Covenanters. " It was now," he goes on to say,
" the seven and twentieth day of the month, and
the thretteenth of the insurrection, when the rebells
marched from Calder Bridge to Colinton, a few
miles from Edinburgh. In some places of the way
they were in view of the Castle, bot at such a
distance that the guns of it could not reach them.
The place they quartered, by reason of a church
and churchyard, a stone bridge, the water, because
of the great raines unfoordable, was defensible
enough against infalls. My guards and I lodged
in the best inne, and about evening, Wallace and
most of his officers gave me a visite. He told me
he was in more trouble for me than for himselfe :
for he found it would be convenient for him to
stay in the field most of the night, which he
thought it would not be fit for me to doe, and
therefore asked me if I wold stay in my lodging
with my guards. Bot I, apprehending my guard
might have order, rather to dispatch me than suffer

VILLAGES. 13

me to be taken from them, told him I wold rather
goe to the field with him. While we were speaking
thus, the noyce of two pistolls gave ane alarm :
Wallace presently left me, hot left order with my
guard to keep me in my lodging till further direc-
tion. After a little time he returned, and told me
it was boysterous and rainie weather, and that he
had resolved to let ane evil night kill itselfe : and
that I might goe and take some rest if I pleased.
. . . About two or three of the o'clock in the
morning, the rebells' quarters without Collingtoun
were beaten by some loyal gentlemen, under the
command of my Lord Ramsay, as I suppose, who
quartered them in the Canongate with some of the
gentry of Lothian, whereof he was Sheriffe. what
number was killed or taken I did not much en-
quire, but they said themselves that a stout re-
sistance was made."

W^hile they were thus engaged, the ferocious
Dalziel was advancing from Glasgow to Lanark at
the head of a small body of regular troops, " he
suddenly learned, however, that the insurgents had
given him the slip, and were in full march towards
the Capital. The poor men had been deceived into
a belief that West Lothian was ready to rise in
their favour and that they had a large party of
friends in the Metropolis itself. Under these false
hopes, they approached as far as Colinton. Here
they learned that the city was fortified, and

14 HISTORY OF COLINTON PARISH.

cannon placed before the gates, that the College
of Justice, which can always furnish a large body
of serviceable men, was under arms, and as their
informer expressed it, every advocate was in his
bandoleers.* They learned at the same time that
their own depressed party within the town had
not the least opportunity or purpose of rising.
Discouraged with this news, and with the de-
fection of many of their army — for the numbers
were now reduced to eight or nine hundred,
dispirited and exhausted by want, disappointment
and fatigue — Learmont and Wallace drew back
their diminished forces to the eastern shoulder of
the Pentland Hills, and encamped on an eminence
called Bullion Green. They had reposed them-
selves for some hours, when, towards evening,
they observed a body of horse coming through
the mountains, by a pass leading from the w-est.
At first the Covenanters entertained the flattering
dream that it was the expected reinforcements
from West Lothian, but the standards and kettle-
drums made it soon evident that it was the
vanguard of Dalziel's troops, which having kept
the opposite skirts of the Pentland Ridge till
they passed the village of Currie, had there

* The bandoleer was a small wooden case covered with
leather containing a charge of powder for a musket ; twelve
generally hung on the same shoulder belt.

VILLAGES. 15

learned the situation of the insurgents and moved
eastward in quest of them by a road through the
hills.

Dalziel instantly led his men to the assault,
the insurgents behaved with courage and twice
repulsed the attack of the Royalists, but it
was renewed by a large force of cavalry on
the insurgent's right wing, which bore down and
scattered a handful of wearied horse who were
there posted, and broke the ranks of the infantr}^.

" O'er Pentlancl hills their flight ignoble plies,

Sinks, stricken with their grievous ■wounds and dies."

The slaughter in the field was very small, not
exceeding fifty men, and only a hundred and fifty
were taken and made prisoners. The King's
cavalry, being composed chiefly of gentlemen,
pitied their unfortunate countrymen, and made
little slaughter : but many were intercepted and
slain by the country people in the neighbourhood,
who were unfriendly to their cause and had sus-
tained some pillage from their detached parties."
So finished that eventful day when the banner
of the Covenant went down in blood.

Whether the people of this district were un-
friendly or not to the champions of the Covenant
it would be difficult to say, there is however,
reason to believe that they were. The Minister
had conformed to Episcopacy and of course the

16 HISTORY OF COLINTON PARISH.

people would not dare to express their convic-
tions with such a spy in their midst. There is
not a single reference made to these important
events in the Kirk Session Records. The follow-
ing is the laconic minute of a meeting held four
days after the Covenanters stay in the village : —
" Dec : 2 : 1666. Sessione mett : nothing acted."

If further evidence is required to shew that the
parishioners of Colinton or rather Hailes, took no
part with the Covenanters, it is to be found in
that Act, dated 4th July 1690, passed in the Second
Session of the first Parliament of King William
and Queen Mary, held in Edinburgh, entitled an
Act rescinding the Forefaulters and fines past since
the year 1665.

In the long list of names of persons included
in the enactment many of whom paid the penalty
for their adherence to the Covenant with their
lives, not a single individual belonging to the
parish of Hailes appears to have taken sufficient
interest in the struggle to incur either forfeiture
of life or property, or to have suflFered fine or
imprisonment.

The only mention made in the Session Records
regarding that distressing period is in a minute,
dated 1 June 1679. " Because the tymes were
troublesome, for it was at the tyme of Bothwell
Bridge the Sessione desyred ye Thesaurer to secure
the poor's money, and again in August of the

VILLAGES. 17

same year the communione was delayed this year
by reasone of ye troublesome tyme, ye countrie
being in confusion qch was occasioned by ye
fight at Bothwell Bridge."

Further than this the village has not figured
much in histor}'-.

Towards the close of last century the little
thatch cottage in front of the New Public School
was the residence of Henry Mackenzie, the " Man
of Feeling."

Mackenzie's is one of the most illustrious names
connected with polite literature in Scotland. He
was born in Edinburgh in 1745. His father was
Dr. Joshua Mackenzie, an eminent physician. After
being educated at the High School and Univer-
sity of Edinburgh, Mr. Mackenzie was articled
to Mr. Inglis of Redhall, in order to acquire a
knowledge of the business of the exchequer, a law
department. His professional labours however, did
not prevent his attachment to literary pursuits.
In 1771 was published his first and very popular
work " The Man of Feeling." Some years after
" The Man of the World " was published as a
counterpart to the other. His next production was
" Julia de Rouhigni" a novel, in a series of letters
desigTied in its turn as a counterpart to the " 3Ian
of the World."

Among Mackenzie's compositions are political
pamphlets, all upon the Tory side, in which he

18 HISTORY OF COLINTON PARISH.

strongly defended the views of his friend Mr.
Henry Dundas, afterwards Lord Melville. These
and other services obtained for him in 1804, the
lucrative office of Comptroller of Taxes for Scot-
land, which he held till his death.

Mackenzie lived in those days when " hard
drinking " was considered the mark of a gentle-
man. Nothing can more powerfully illustrate the
deep-rooted character of intemperance in families
than an anecdote which comes from Mackenzie.
He had been invited to dine with a party in the
district, and when the time had come for the
bowl to be introduced, some jovial and thirsty
member of the company proposed as a toast " The
Outward Bound." The hint was taken and the
silks and satins moved off to the drawing-room,
Mackenzie had kept as free from the usual excesses
as he was able, and as he marked companions
around him falling victims to the power of drink,
he himself dropped off under the table among the
" slain " as a measure of precaution, and lying-
there his attention was called to a small pair of
hands working about his throat ; on asking what
it meant, a voice replied " Sir, I'm the laddie that's
to lowse the neck-cloths." Here then was a family
where, on such occasions, it was the appointed
duty of one of the household to attend and when
the guests were become helpless, to untie their
cravats in fear of apoplexy or suffocation.

VILLAGES. 19

Mr. Mackenzie after a comparatively brief period
of decline, died in 1831, aged eighty-six years.

As a novelist and essayist, Mackenzie still ranks
in the first class, though perhaps rather by a
reflection of his former fame, than through any
active or sincere appreciation of his writings by the
present generation. It is perhaps unfair to judge
of the intellectual efforts of an author by any other
age than his own, seeing that as Johnston well
remarks : — " The most of men content themselves
if they only can in some degree outstrip their
predecessors." Mackenzie is supposed to have also
spent many of his declining years at Colinton
Bank House.

Another old worthy whose name is still green
in the parish is that of Mr. James Gillespie, the
founder of the excellent Hospital in Edinburgh
which bears his name. He was a tobacco and snuff
manufacturer at Spylaw, near the village of Colinton,
and accumulated a large fortune in that business.
He kept a carriage of some kind, and the story is
told that one day meeting Henry Erskine, he asked
for a motto to place upon it. Erskine at once
facetiously suggested this couplet : —

" Wha wad hae thocht it,
That noses had bocht it." — "Quid rides."

Whether he adopted tlie appropriate motto is not
told.

20 HISTORY OF COLINTON PARISH.

Mr. Gillespie lived among his workmen in
homely and patriarchal style, and though far from
being miserly was extremely frugal and indus-
trious, his favourite maxim being " waste not, want
not." Even in extreme age one might have seen
him with an old blanket round him and a night-
cap on, both covered with snuff attending the mill
and superintending the operations of his man,
Andrew Fraser.

A singular thing about Mr. Gillespie is, that no
trace can be found of his parentage or origin. He
never was married. In his will Mr. Gillespie
appointed as chaplain to his Hospital, Mr. Macrae,
the author of a " Revised translation and interpre-
tation of the Sacred Scriptures after the eastern
manner," and who lived for many years at Spylaw.
The following is also an extract from his will,
which will be practical information to many : —
Inter alia, " And I recommend and appoint the
preferences of admission to the said Hospital to be
as follows : — First, Anne Bishop, John Whyte and
his wife, and said Anne Mercer ; John Black, an
old servant ; and Robert Ross, wright in Collington,
also an old servant, with all others who have been
or may be my hired servants, whatever their age
may be. Secondly, poor persons of the name
of Gillespie, lifty-five years of age and upwards,
whatever part of Scotland they may come from.
Thirdly, the poor belonging to Edinburgh and its

VILLAGES. 21

suburbs, aged fifty-five years or upwards. Fourthly,
failing of applications from poor belonging to
Edinburgh and its suburbs, men and women aged
fifty-five years and upwards belonging to Leith,
Newhaven, and other parts of the county of Mid-
Lothian ; and lastly, failing of application from all
these places, poor coming from any part of Scotland.
And as the intention of the Hospital is to be as
extensively useful as possible, none are to be ad-
mitted into it who have an allowance from any
other charity : and out-pensioners are not to be
admitted on any account, and the governors are
strictly charged upon their conscience to elect or
receive into the Hospital none but decent, godly
and well-behaved men and women." Lord Cockburn
in his Memorials, writes : — " Gillespie's Hospital,
for the shrouding of aged indigence, was com-
menced about this time, and completed in 1805.
If I recollect right, this was the first of the public
charities of this century by which Edinburgh has
been blessed, or cursed. The founder was a snuff
seller, who brought up an excellent young man as
his heir, and then left death to disclose that, for
the vanity of being remembered by a thing called
after himself, he had all the while had a deed
executed, by which this, his nearest relation, was
disinherited."

However, we do not know the circumstances,
and remembering the proverb : " De mortuis nil

22 HISTORY OF COLINTON PARISH.

nisi bonum," and also that little is known of the
character or disposition of Mr. Gillespie, the founder
of such charities as these may be reasonably sup-
posed to have walked through life with a steady
pace and an observant eye, neglecting no oppor-
tunity of assisting those who were not so favoured
as himself in the share of this world's goods. A
painting of Mr. Gillespie's curious physiognomy
may be seen in the Merchant Company's Hall,
Hanover Street, Edinburgh, painted by Sir James
Foulis of Woodhall, Bart. He was buried in the
Church-yard here, and the inscription over his
tomb is as follows: —

' ' Here rests the remains of

JAMES GILLESPIE, of Spylaw,

who bequeathed the bulk of his fortune for the

endowment of an Hospital in the Citj of Edinburgh, for

the maintenance of aged men and women, and of

a free School for the education of poor

boys, both of which have proved

most useful public charities."

I might here make mention before I leave the
village, of an Institution though it was connected
with the parish generally, namely Colinton play.
The second Friday of July was what was called
" head quarter day " with the Colinton Friendly
Society, and upon this day a demonstration was held
and also a general holiday throughout the parish, in
order that the people might attend the play.

VILLAGES. 23

The members all met at Colinton in the morning,
and each (though this was in the earlier days of
the Society) dressed in their clean white knee
breeches with curious shaped black coats, pro-
menaded through the parish with their band and
banners and flower decorations. The leading
feature of the demonstration left upon my recollec-
tion was Thomas Lawrie, the officer, leading with a
large ugly looking sword over his shoulder. When
they returned to the village, the streets were lined
with stalls selling sweeties, popguns, and many
other articles suitable to our boyish tastes an<.l
inclinations ; while our elders, who considered
themselves too old for countenancing the stalls,
danced where it was possible (the roads being in a
very different condition than at present) to the
music of the bands. A ball for the more important
folks, members of the Society, &c., brought to a
close this very important day.

I would take the liberty of quoting a " Jubilee
Address " which was found posted on the end of a
cash book belonging to the Society, which throws
some light upon this ancient and very useful
Association, not to mention anything about the
merit of the lay itself : —

"JUBILEE ADDRESS,"

Written by Archibald Innes, Member of Colinton
Friendly Society, read at a dinner held in the Parish School-

24 HISTORY OF COLINTON PARISH.

Room of Colinton, on Friday, the 14th day of July 1854,
in commemoration of the fiftieth year of the Society's
existence.

" By proxy, these presents I send to you greeting,
On this fiftieth year of our annual meeting ;
A year much remembered — of great notoriety —
For Colinton Junior Friendly Society.
And since first it began, there at present remains,
Very few of those then that recorded their names ;
While many members have died, whose loss we deplore.
Since first it commenced in Eighteen hundred and four.
Yet still we are thankful that kind friends exist,
Such as Cunningham and King, the first on the list.
And Elliot and Dawson, my mates at the school,
When strict old father Weir with his taws did bear rule,
And other school-fellows, in similar condition
Would nod when we meet with kind recognition,
As yearly we came to your bland invitation
To pay our arrears, as our regular donation.

But forgetting past scenes of our earlier days.

Which form little ground either for census or praise,

I beg your attention to what now I would say,

On this Anniversary and Jubilee day : —

I congratulate you on your object attained,

On the means you have used — on the ends you have

gained ;
On the good you have done to the poor and distressed.
Laid low by affliction — with dire poverty press'd.
By prompt calling when members had drawn their last

breath.
And left their lone homes, then invaded by death,
Supplying what is needful, on urgent commands.
When sickness or funeral expenses demands ;

VILLAGES. 25

To comfort the widow, the bereaved and forlorn
Whom Heaven had appointed in sorrow to mourn
For many a kind man, whom they held very dear,
Whom before, like some present, met once in the year.
But we must follow those gone on before
And to society meetings will then come no more.

I can truly believe that, on looking around,

A hopeful young race, who with wisdom abound.

Ay will follow your plans, as strictly directed

For good to all those who are thereby connected ;

Of all such who require it, supplying their needs,

And pursuing the path where humanity leads.

Full many a one from experience can tell

As I also can when at home and unwell

With my weekly allowance, when put in your mind

Your visitor, Elliot, was never behind.

But now, I am thankful, I seldom require it.

Though my friend's attention I still do admire it.

To conclude, I can wish you all comfort and peace
That true concord and harmony never may cease,
That abundant prosperity ever may reign
In that friendly society which now you sustain ;
And may a rich blessing from kind heaven above
Always characterize you with brotherly love."

The village of Colinton is about the centre of the
parish, and beautifully situated in the picturesque
and richly wooded valley through wliich the Water
of Leith slowly winds its way. The late James
Ballantyne describes the village in his " Miller of
Deanhaugh," with " its romantic valley, its lines of

26 HISTORY OF COLINTON PARISH.

cottages embedded in the hollows ; its kail yards,
and their rows of currant bushes ; its sylvan path-
ways threading the mazes of wood, deep, deep
down in the beautiful dell." The village has of
course somewhat changed for the better since that
was written. Many old English-looking houses
have arisen upon the upper out-skirts within the
last few years. The population is about 780. The
village is surrounded by many lovely walks, and
much of what might be called " sweet sylvan
scenery," which makes the village quite a holiday
resort. The dell, for instance, is one of the loveliest
walks in the vicinity of Edinburgh.

"The loveliest spot in all that lovely vale."
"Ye sacred haunts hallowed by lovers' trystings and
their sacred vows."

Since the powers that be would no longer tolerate
the pollution of the river bed with lime, ley and
other combustibles, a very great improvement has
taken place. Instead of the black, smelling, frothy
water, we now see a clear stream with people fishing
along its banks, which makes it a truly Highland
scene and yet within a very short distance from the
city. But yet, where can you find, for many miles
round Edinburgh, an unsophisticated spot that is
not invaded by the tea kettle and the luncheon
basket of the picnicker. — Ne exeat.

VILLAGES. 27

SLATEFORD.

To the east of the parish and about 2| miles
from the west end of Princes Street, is the village
of Sclaitfurd or Slateford. We find the first
mention made of this village in the year 1654,
when a certain James Scobie was delated for
breaking the liord's day, by " going away from
the Kirk after foirnoones sermon and not return-
ing to sanctifie the remainder of the day." The
name is probably derived from the ford which
passed through the Water of Leith there before
the present bridge was built, and the blaze or
slaty rock found so plentifully in the neighbour-
hood— consequently Slaitforde.

About the year 1782 the United Secession held
their meetings here, afterwards fixing it as their
place of worship. This was the scene of the early
pastoral labours of the Rev. Dr. John Dick and
followed by the Rev. John Belfrage, M.D. I shall
have occasion to speak more fully of the two
famous men further on.

In October of 1886, one of the most severe
attacks of cholera that has ever been known in
the district settled upon Slateford, and for a time
it seemed as if the little village was to be com-
pletely exterminated.

It was supposed to have been contracted from

28 HISTORY OF COLINTON PARISH.

clothes brought to Inglis-Green, or rags brought
to Katesmill, anyhow the plague did come with
all its horrors. At the first outbreak all who could
leave fled from the village leaving it in a semi-
deserted condition, shops closed, the shopkeepers
having fled, nothing went on but attending the
dead and dying. The public hall was converted
into a hospital. In one week flfteen died including
one of the nurses. Great praise was due to Lord
Dunfermline, Chairman of the Local Authority,
who had seen much of these horrors abroad and
who with Dr. John Balfour attended every day
this scene of death and saw that the arrangements
for its mitigation were being carried out.

At Gray's Mill — so called, it is believed, after
some early miller of note who has left only his
name, a little to the north of the village is a
small room, which is still inhabited and in which
Prince Charles in 1745 resided for a short time,
and here his deputies from the city met him to
arrange about its capitulation, but their delibera-
tions were suddenly brought to an end by the
entry of 900 Claymores into Edinburgh, headed
by Sir Evan Dhu Cameron of Lochiel.

The little window above the doorway is said to
be the room in which the Prince slept and through
which he must have watched the clans who had
spent the night in the field in front. The iron
ring to which his steed was secured, upon his

VILLAGES. 29

arrival, still keeps its hold to one of the stable
door lintels of the farm.

Close by are the white-washed dye and bleach
works of Inglis-Green, about which artists may find
interest in its associations with John Macwhirter,
who was the son of the mill master long resident
there. The works must have been in operation
for many years, in 1788 Mr. Macwhirter has the
following notice in the Edinburgh Advertiser: —
" Inglis-Green, Bleachfield, 1788 :— Near Slateford,
two miles and a half west from Edinburgh, Hugh
Macwhirter bleaches in the best manner at the
following prices," and so on,

" Mr. Macwhirter who begs leave to assure his
employers that the utmost attention is paid to
their cloth, which is wholly wet bleached."

Over the village of Slateford stands a lofty
aqueduct bridge of eight arches carrying the Union
Canal across the vale of the Water of Leith into
the parish of Edinburgh.

Yet further to the north and close to the
northern boundary of the parish, our attention is
attracted by the freestone quarry of Hailes, the
quarry which has produced the stones for a large
portion of the buildings of Edinburgh. An in-
teresting fact connected with the quarry is that
it has been working continuously for over 340
years. In what is now the centre of the workings
stood the old thatch roofed village of Hailes, but

30 HISTORY OF COLINTON PARISH.

a number of years ago it was entirely removed to
allow further working and is now the richest part
of the quarry. There are three different colours of
stone, and curious enough they are the colour of
our national flag — red, white and blue. At present
the quarry employs about 150 persons made up of
quarrymen and labourers, not including the large
number employed as carters, &c. The relation
between the employer and employed seems to have
been of a cordial character as strikes are quite
unknown. There are good wages and the con-
dition of the workmen otherwise satisfactory.
Nearly 100,000 tons of stones are taken from the
quarry on an average yearly. In some years, how-
ever, this has been considerably exceeded. Em-
ployment is given to a large number of contractors
who cart the stones to the railway station or to
the builder. With this department, however, the
managers have nothing to do, it being arranged
with the parties who get the stones. The daily
average of loaded carts leaving the quarry is about
500.

The making of bricks is the latest development
at Hailes quarry ; and it appears likely to succeed.
The bricks are of a pretty light brown colour, with
a turnout of between eight to ten thousand a day.
This new industry employs a goodly number of
men. The quarry is upon the estate of Hailes, be-
longing to Sir Thomas D. G. Carmichael, Bart.

VILLAGES, 31

With much of the modern, Sir Thomas is ready to
give a trial to any movement that is likely to be
productive of present or future good. The impetus
which has been given to scientific study of late
years has been, in a great measure, due to the
fostering care and stimulus which he has given to
the subject. Sir Thomas, who may be fittingly
described as a model country gentleman, succeeded
to the title and estate on the death of his father.
Sir William Henry Carmichael, in 1891.

BONALY.

The village of Bonailie, at the date of which I
write, must have stood a little to the west of the
present Bonaly House. The first mention of the
village on record is in 1652. It must have been
then of some considerable size and of some impor-
tance in the parish, as mention is made of it very
frequently in the Kirk Session Records. The
people were employed at what was called waulking.
The wheels of those quaint old water-mills would
be turned by the water of the Bonaly burn upon
which they stood, and wliich was also at one time
larger than it is at present. Dr. Balfour, the minis-
ter of the parish, writing sixty years ago says : —
" The distillery has disappeared, the skinnery, its
name is lost, having given place to the more poetic
designation of Laverock Dale : the magnesia manu-

32 HISTORY OF COLINTON PARISH.

factory is in ruins : the noise of the waulk-mills
no longer reminds the passenger of its existence ;
and the mill for beating flax is, comparatively
speaking, in little use. Still the parish flourishes :
the population increases : the rental has improved
and " (adds the good man) " could a little more
of that right-hearted prudence, which inclines and
through God's blessing, enables man to value and
steadily comply with the counsels of Heavenly
truth, be infused into the bosom of the generality
of the people, they would be blessed indeed." The
above mentioned industries all stood upon the
Bonaly burn.

JUNIPER-GREEN.

The thriving village of Juniper-Green is situated
in the western extremity of the parish, but is of
very recent origin (first mentioned in the records in
1707) having nothing of any historical importance
connected with it, except perhaps as being the
temporary residence of Thomas Carlyle after his
marriage, which took place at Comely Bank, Edin-
burgh. It was this village he refers to in his
" R,eminiscence " where " his first expei-ience in the
difficulties of housekeeping began." Apparently at
this time Carlyle's health was unsatisfactory so
that perfect quietness was absolutely necessary,
and he had come to Juniper-Green for that purpose,
but as in Edinburgh, his house was the rendezvous

VILLAGES. 33

of the literary fraternity of the day, such as
Guthrie, Lord Jeffrey, Chalmers, and others.

We have also had the honour of having resident
amongst us in this village. Emeritus Professor
David Masson, an eminent Scottish author. He
was born at Aberdeen on the 2nd of December
1822, educated at Marischall College there, and at
the University of Edinburgh. At nineteen he was
editor of a Scotch provincial paper, and later joined
the staff of W. & R. Chambers. Masson's greatest
work is his ponderous "Life of John Milton,
(1859-80)." In 1865 he was appointed Professor of
Rhetoric and English Literature in the University
of Edinburgh (see " An Edinburgh Eleven.")

The village of Juniper Green stands in the middle
of what at one time was Currie Muir, a famous
badger hunting ground, and is, as I said before, of
very recent origin. In an old Ordinance Survey of
" Ten miles round Edinburgh," published at the
beginning of the nineteenth century, there is no
appearance of Juniper Green at all. The name
Curriemuirend is very old and probably derived
from the fact that the houses stood at Currie-muir-
end. The chief employment of the people is the
paper making industry.

The old snuff mill at the water side is a reminis-
cence of " the good old times ? " While other indus-
tries have advanced with leaps and bounds, the old
snuff mill continues, as of yore, to jog along quietly>.

34 HISTORY OF COLINTON PARISH.

looking as if it knew no change and intended none.
The habit of snuff taking seems to be fast dying
out, and is rather of a past than a present custom,
so out of the little colony of snuff mills only two
remain, the other being about quarter of a mile
further up the river, and the only two now left in
Scotland.

On the opposite side of the Water of Leith stands
the old mansion-house of Woodhall, purchased from
the Cunninghams about the year 1701, by Sir John
Foulis, of Ravelston, a progenitor of the Foulis, of
Colinton House. This ancient family being now
represented by Sir William Liston Foulis, Bart., of
Millburn Tower, Ratho.

The house is prettily situated, with a fine
southern exposure to the hills. In the wall is
an antique facet-faced sun dial, which had at one
time a plate fixed to it bearing the inscription
" Made by John Justice, and gifted to Woodhall,
1717." It may be a specimen of amateur dialling,
by young John Justice of Crichton, whom, (from
Foulis's account book), we find ten years before this
date, fitted out with a boy's set of clubs and balls for
Leith Links, by his grandfather, the first Foulis of
Woodhall, neither of them dreaming that some day
golf would come so far out as Juniper Green.

In the absence of better matter, I am tempted to
subjoin here a story relating, it is said, to one of
the Cunninghams of Woodhall, Sir John, who was

1320178

y)jliilia^ikiiililiitU'i^iii'.ii))^iMij,Ujji4)jlli;iitf,t«wibii;<i.\)U<m

'•SIR 4,/^tS FOV L L E Shi:

^iUiUUl

,)^^^i'\k^d^«l^'''''""'V'\'^'"'^>''Y^^^^^

Dial in Corner of Parish Church.

36 HISTORY OF COLINTON PARISH.

raised, I think, to the Bench as Lord Woodhall.
The story is related by Sir Walter Scott in his
" Tales o£ a Grandfather," in showing the monstrous
absurdities of witchcraft and everything pertaining
to it. Woodhall, it would seem, was one of the
seven judges who were appointed to hear cases in
the administration of public justice in Scotland
during the protectorate, and to make circuits for
that purpose : — " An old woman was brought before
him for using a spell to cure dimness of sight, by
hanging a clew of yarn round the neck of the
patient. Marvellous things were told by the wit-
nesses of the cures which this spell had performed
on the patients, far beyond the reach of ordinary
medicine. The poor woman made no other defence
than by protesting that if there was any witchcraft
in the ball of yarn, she knew nothing of it. It had
been given her, she said, thirty years before by a
young student for the cure of one of her own
family, who, having used it with advantage for a
disorder in her eyes, she had seen no harm in
lending it for the relief of others who laboured
under the same infirmity, or in accepting a small
gratuity for doing so. Her defence was little
attended to by the jury ; but the judge was much
aeitated. He asked the woman where she resided
when she obtained possession of this valuable relic.
She gave the name of the village in which she had
in former times kept a petty alehouse. He then

VILLAGES. 37

looked at the clew very earnestly, and at length
addressed the jury. "■ Gentlemen," he said, " we
are on the point of committing a great injustice to
this poor woman, and to prevent it I must publicly
confess a piece of early folly, which does me no
honour. At the time this poor creature speaks of I
was at College leading an idle and careless life,
which, had I not been given grace to correct, it
must have made it highly improbable that ever I
should have attained my present situation. I
chanced to remain for a day and night in this
woman's alehouse without having money to dis-
charge my reckoning. Not knowing what to do,
and seeing her much occupied with a child who had
weak eyes, I had the meanness to pretend that I
could write out a spell that would mend her
daughter's eyes if she would accept it instead of
her bill. The ignorant woman readily agreed ; and
I scrawled some figures on a piece of parchment
and added two lines of nonsensical doggerel, in
ridicule of her credulity, and caused her to make it
up in that clew, which has so nearly cost her her
life. To prove the truth of this, let the yarn be
unwound and you may judge of the efficacy of the
spell." The clew was unwound accordingly, and
the following pithy couplet was found on the
enclosed bit of parchment —

" The devil scratch out both thine eyes,
And spit into the holes likewise."

38 HISTORY OF COLINTON PARISH.

It was evident that those who had been cured
by such a spell must have been indebted to nature.
But the users of such charms were not always so
lucky as to light on the person who drew them up :
and doubtless many innocent and unfortunate
creatures were executed, as this poor alewife would
have been had not she lighted upon her former
customer in the unsuspected character of her
Judge. These are things which the dignified muse
of history will scarcely condescend to record or
notice, and are perhaps better described in idle
gossip like this than by the historic page.

SWANSTON.

Swanston, that " least considerable of hamlets,"
lies to the south-east extremity of the parish and
on the estate of Mortonhall. The name is very old,
and must have in years gone by, been of much
more importance than now, having diminished into
a little moorland hamlet of some twenty houses,
which Robert Louis Stevenson thus graphically
describes : — " The road goes down through the
valley and then finally begins to scale the main
slope of the Pentlands. A bouquet of old trees
stands round a white- washed farmhouse, and from
a neighbouring dell you can see smoke rising and
leaves rustling in the breeze. Straight above, the

VILLAGES. 39

hills climb a thousand feet into the air. The
neighbourhood about the time of lambs is clamorous
with the bleating of flocks, and you will be
awakened in the gray of summer mornings by the
barking of a dog or the voice of a shepherd shout-
ing to the echoes. This, with the hamlet lying
behind unseen, is Swanston."

I should hardly deemed it necessary to have
mentioned the existence of such a place, but from
the fact that it was here where Stevenson spent a
large portion of his youth — Swanston Cottage being
his father's country house. It would be quite
superfluous here to go into the details of a life and
writings which are so well-known to the reading
public as that of E.. L. Stevenson. I must there-
fore confine myself as much as possible to his life
in this parish.

Stevenson was descended from Robert Stevenson
of Bell Rock fame. His father was Mr. Thomas
Stevenson, also a notable engineer, widely known
and greatly honoured, the builder of the famous
lighthouses of " Skerryvore," " The Chickens,"
" Dhu Heartach," and many shore lights and
harbours. His mother was Margaret, youngest
daughter of the Rev. Lewis Balfour, Minister of
Colinton.

Until his grandfather's death in 1860, when
Robert was ten years old, the manse at Colinton
was the little boy's favourite residence, and always

40 HISTORY OF COLINTON PARISH.

wished bis mother to agree with him that grand-
papa's house was the nicest in the world, but his
mother naturally maintained that their home was
the best.

In 1854, when the degree of Doctor of Divinity-
was given to Mr. Balfour, the small Louis, on
hearing his grandfather spoken of as Doctor,
immediately said, " Now that grandpapa is a
a doctor surely you'll have him instead of Dr.
Hunter." A wonderful quick thought and old-
fashioned remark for a child of four, but a
suggestively sad one too ; he already knew well the
necessity of a doctor to help human beings in their
ailments although he could not yet apprehend the
use of one for the " cure " of souls.

The taking of Swauston Cottage in 1867 as the
summer house of the Stevensons was, he tells us,
another epoch-making event. The boy apparently
took intense pleasure in his rambles about the hills,
in his dreamy rests on " Kirk-yetton " and " Aller-
muir," and in his wanderings with John Tod the
shepherd, after that worthy had ceased, as he
comically puts it, to hunt him off as a dangerous
sheepscarer, the two soon became great friends, and
many a bit of strange philosophy, many a wild tale
of bygone droving days, the lad heard from the old
man. Another great friend of early Swanston days
was Robert Young, the gardener, " that man of
peace and eke of wilfulness," whose austere and

VILLAGES. 41

puritan views of life were solemnly shared by his
young master.

There still resides in Swanston a few who had
the pleasure of close intimacy with the vagrant
scholar, and have much to say in their slow, quiet
way about " the lang-haired idle-set laddie " that
often joined them while engaged in their pastoral
labours.

Owing to my official capacity, I was admitted
into the confidence of the people of Swanston at
once. Otherwise there is a particularly strong-
crust of reserve to be broken through before the
genuine communicativeness of their character can be
reached, but when once gained they are courteous,
kindly, and friendly, always ready for a " crack "
and eager to hear and retail the " news " of the
day.

The " douce " inhabitants of Swanston did not
know very well what to make of Stevenson,
although they had to succumb to the youth's
winning personality, they would shake their heads
doubtfully at his wandering proclivities, and could
not divine his business among the hills with his
note-book and bit pencil.

Undoubtedly it was here that he gathered his
first impressions of nature, and it was from his
careful study of the inhabitants of that homely
glen that he gained that knowledge of, and insight
into, those fast-dying types of Scottish life and

42 HISTORY OF COLINTON PARISH.

character, the portrayal of which has endeared him
more to the mass of his countrymen than his more
famous productions ; and here it may be said that
the best way to understand Stevenson is for visitors
to get, if possible, into personal touch with the
present inhabitants of the hamlet, — by no means
an easy matter, for as one of them quaintly puts
it, " we steek our doors when we see a stranger
on the green."

It was his father's intention that young
Stevenson should follow the family profession of
engineering, and with this view he went to the
Edinburgh University in the autumn of 1868.

He, however, forsook the profession of engineer-
ing and attended the law classes with the intention
of being called to the Bar ; but he proved to be no
more an exemplary student of law than he had
been of engineering, finding more satisfaction in his
truant rambles and meditations in old graveyards
than he did in the studies of his profession.

Mr. and Mrs. Stevenson felt it a keen disappoint-
ment that their son could not walk in his father's
footsteps, and very naturally wished him to have a
profession to fall back upon, should literature, the
profession he had chosen, not prove successful. It
was agreed that he should read for the Bar, and
forthwith entered the office of Messrs. Skene,
Edwards & Garson, W.S. His heart was not,
however, in the law courts, and already in that

VILLAGES. 43

book-lined study at Heriot Row his life-work had
begun.

The very frailty of tenure by which their son
had always held his life had always been a daily
anxiety to his parents. All through his life the
shadow of death was never quite out of his sight,
the skeleton hand was continually beckoning to
him. In one so handicapped it is wonderful to
observe his cheerfulness, his courage, the magnitude
of his work, and carefulness of his research.

It was when travelling in quest of health that he
met in San Francisco in 1879 the lady he chose to
be his wife, Fanny Van de Grift Osbourne of
Indiana, a lady in whom he found the very highest
ideals of womanhood, so that his ideal of matrimony,
so beautifully described in " Verinibus Puerisque,"
was fully realised.

The necessity of Mr, Stevenson's health always
made them wanderers, which finally ended in far
Samoa, where he died on the evening of the Srd
December 1894 at the early age of 44.

The tomb of Stevenson on the top of Veal Vaca
Mountain at Samoa consists of a simple block of
concrete raised on a platform of the same material.
On each side of this sarcophagus, so reared as to
withstand all trials by tempest, have now been
placed the two tablets designed by Mr, G. Burgess,
On one is inscribed the requiem prepared by
Stevenson himself with the years of his birth and

44 HISTORY OF COLINTON PARISH.

death, — " Alpha and Omega, the beginning and the
end." On the other tablet is traced the legend in
Samoa — " The High Chief Grave of Tusitala," and
two verses translated from the book of Ruth —
" Whither thou goest I will go, and where thou
lodgest I will lodge ; thy people shall be my people,
and thy God my God." Also, " Where thou diest I
will die, and there will I be buried." " The Bottle
Imp " were perhaps easier to translate into Samoan
than were these texts : but now and again natives
linger around the grave of " the teller of tales."
His remote burying-place, though visited by few of
his countrymen, will always be held to be their
inalienable and particular possession and that of all
the English-speaking world.

(^i]iapiev III.

CHURCHES.

" At church with meek and unaflFected grace,
His looks adorn'd the venerable place ;
Truth from his lips prevail'd with double sway,
And fools, who came to scoff, remained to pray."

HE ancient Church of St. Cuthberts
and Hailles, now Colinton, founded
in or about the year 1095, was
granted to Dunfermline Abbey by
Prince Ethelred, third son of Malcolm Canmore
and Queen Margaret, a gift confirmed by a Royal
Charter of David I. and by a Bull of Pope Gregory
in 1234. This old church which most likely took
the place of a still older Pictish, British or Saxon
Fane, disappeared about the year 1560, probably
destroyed during the invasion of the Earl of
Hereford in 1544-45, and is supposed to have
stood where the Hailes House now stands. The
present site was chosen and a church was placed
here in the year 1636 in the reign of Charles I.
In the Session Records of 1681 the following note
within brackets is found ( " our kirk was repaired
Anno 1681). No better proof of the poverty of

46 HISTORY OF COLINTON PARISH.

these times could be found than the difficulties
experienced in raising the money for the repairs
referred to. The Heritors were not able evidently
to meet the " casts " and so the session advanced
the sum of £40 out of the poor's box, but in 1696
fifteen years after the repairs had been executed
we find " the money in ye kirk box is all expended
upon ye poor and for kirk dues and yt the treasurer
is out of purse and that the number of indigent
persons within ye paroch is increased." The session
therefore resolved to sue the Heritors for the
money they had expended and gave " ful power
and commissione to my Lord Collingtoune and
Edward Burtone, treasurer, to uplift for us and
in our name ye money in ye Heritors' hands and
if need bees to pursue ye recusant before ye com-
missar court or any oyr court competent within yis
realm and act and doe for us to ye effect aforesaid,
viz : — for suppling the poor to ye utermost of yair
power and to grant discharges upon ye receipt of
ye money," the money, however, was paid back at
intervals.

About the year 1770 this church, according to
the architect's report was found " ruinous and
dangerous and aught to be taken down and rebuilt.
The walls appearing as if they were built with
drystone and bedded with old lime rubbish, having
no band whatever," and the Heritors began about
this time to knock out doors and build galleries or

CHURCHES. 47

" lofts " on the sides of the church, which of course
would help to hasten its ruin. So in the year 1771
the present church was built at the nominal ex-
pense of £322. Yet the raising of this compara-
tively small sum seems to have been again fraught
with difficulties as the Kirk Session had to lend
the Heritors £50 of the poor's money to help in the
seating, and this time though there is abundant
evidence of the Heritors having received the money,
there being three receipts for the same signed by
some of the Heritors in the end of the old Session
Minute Book, there is no mention made of them
having paid it back, this, however, must be con-
sidered jpro confesso.

The church was re-seated in 1896 when the old
fashioned precentor's desk &c., was put aside. It
is seated for 660, divided among the Heritors of
the parish.

The church which is encircled by an old church-
yard, is romantically situated on the sloping
eminence at the head of the Dell and round which
the Water of Leith winds slowly on its way to the
Firth of Forth—

" Beneath those rugged elms, that yew tree shade,
Where heaves the turf in many a mold'ring heap.
Each in his narrow cell forever laid,

The rude forefathers of the hamlet sleep."

The churchyard is fully half an acre in size, a very
interesting place. It is well tilled with tombstones.

48 HISTORY OF COLINTON PARISH.

many of which are very much dilapidated and all

inscription obliterated by the storms of centuries

the oldest one dated as far back as 1598.

Heir lyes ane

Honourable Woman A. Hiriot,

SpOUS to J. FOULIS OF COLLINGTOUN,

QUHA DIED 8 August 1593.
The quaint inscriptions on some of the old
monuments lighten the gloom of the place and
sometimes makes one smile amid the sad and de-
pressing influences of surrounding graves, for
instance : —

" Here lyes the dust of
William Niven,
weaver in Slatefoord,
who died April 11, 1791,
Aged 74 Years.
Death's a dett.
To nature deu,
I have paid it,
So mon you."

Here lyes Jean Thamson,
closed within death's perisoner
through Adam's sin,
But rests in hope that she shall be
Set by the second Adam free,
who was spous to Gilbert Thom,
who departed this life the first
of February, her age 60 years.
Anno, Dom. 1678.
No gravestones bearing humorous inscriptions
upon them were erected during this century, they

An Old Monument.

50 HISTORY OF COLINTON PARISH.

mostly belong to the seventeenth and eighteenth
centuries, when odd inscriptions were frequently
carved upon tombs. Yet many a noble heart may
lie in these neglected spots awaiting the restitution
of all things with nothing to indicate that they
ever existed.

" Nor you, ye proud, impute to those the fault.

If memory o'er their tomb no trophy raise,
Where thro' the long-drawn aisle and fretted vault,

The pealing anthem swells the note of praise.

Perhaps in this neglected spot is laid,

Some heart once pregnant with celestial fire,

Hands, that the rod of empire might have sway'd,
Or wak'd to ecstacy the living lyre.

Some village Hampden, that, with dauntless breast,
The little tyrant of his fields withstood,

Some mute inglorious Milton here may rest.
Some Cromwell guiltless of his country's blood.

Far from the madding crowd's ignoble strife.
Their sober wishes never learn'd to stray,

Along the cool sequester'd vale of life,

They kept the noiseless tenour of their way.

Their names, their years spelt by unletter'd uiuse.

The place of fame and elegy supply.
And many a holj' text around is strew'd.

That teach the rustic moralist to die.

Let not ambition mock their useful toil.

Their homely joys, and destiny obscure.

Nor grandeur hear with a disdainful smile,

The short and simple annals of the poor."

Gray.

52 HISTORY OF COLINTON PARISH.

We may see here also another link to the last
century in the shape of an iron mort-safe. At
one time there were three or four, but the others
have, some how or other, been broken up, our
fathers have been good enough however to leave
this one. It is coffin shape, measuring 7' long by
2|' broad and 1' 6" in height, weighing about a ton.
This safe was in use during the time of the re-
surrectionists at the end of last century and the
beginning of this, the purpose of it being to prevent
the newly buried bodies from being dug up and
carried away for dissecting purposes. These safes
were placed firmly on the grave after a person had
been interred, and kept there until the body was
too far decayed for that purpose. During this time
the villagers were obliged to take their turn in
watching the graveyard, armed with a gun, which if
necessary they seemed at liberty to use. Many are
the amusing though rather gruesome stories told of
the adventures with the body snatchers, but the
truth of most of them being questionable, I am
compelled to refuse them admission here.

From the Minutes of the Kirk Session may be
gleaned a list of the parish Ministers from an early
date, but owing to the inaccuracy of the Minutes
the dates will not follow one another closely, and
in many cases we have nothing to record about
them except their name.

Alexander Livingstone was Pastor when the first

CHURCHES. 53

Minute was recorded in 1651 and was so till his
death in 1660. The following is a copy of the
tombstone erected to Livingstone, and which is
still to be seen in the churchyard. The asterisks
indicate obliterations.

.s

YATET Hon

M
A L

HIC ;KEPOSIT.E SVNI

* * * EEVEREND

******

ALEXANKI LEVING

STONII HVIVS
******

HAILEIS

Q V 0 N D A M

*

*

*

* * *

*

*

*

VIGILANT

*

*

*

OBIIT 4 D

*

*

*

1660 MT *

*

*

*

After Mr. Livingstone, a Mr. Robert Bennet is
minister from 1660 to 1681. Then "No sermon
till 1682." Mr Thomas Murray 1682-1685. Mr.

54 HISTORY OF COLINTON PARISH.

Samuel Nimmo 1686-1694. Mr. Nimmo conformed
to Episcopacy, and upon the return of Presbyterian-
ism he was deposed by the Presbytery of Edinburgh.
Mr. Ja. Thomson 1694-1697. Mr. Thomas Paterson
1697-1700. Mr. Walter Allan 1700-1732. A
monument in the churchyard bears the following
inscription —

" To the memory of
The Rev. Walter Allan, Mmister of the Gospel
att Colintoun, who diligently and faithfully
discharged the duties of that sacred office in
that parish for the space of 32 years, this plain
monument is a testimony of her conjugal
affection is errected and dedicated by his
sorrowful relict, Isobell Brown. He died 22nd
of November 1732 aged 54 years."

Mr. George Gibson 1732-1746. Dr. John Hynd-
man 1746-1752. Mr. Robert Fisher 1753-17S3.
Dr. John Walker 1783-1804. At the time of Dr.
Walker's ordination the patronage of the parish
was held by " My Lord Lauderdale." His rights
as such had not been exercised for many years,
the choice of ministers being left to the congre-
gation and kirk-session, a state of things which,
in my humble opinion, should never have been
otherwise. However, at the death of Mr. Fisher,
the noble Earl thought himself quite justified in
ignoring the wishes of the people, and proceeded
forthwith to induct Dr. Walker as minister. The
congregation naturally considered this as an

CHURCHES. 55

outrage upon their feelings, and so embittered were
they that at his first service (my informant was a
parish worthy now deceased) that he was nearly
jostled out at the gate by the gown tails. Many of
the people left the church and joined the Secession
Congregation then meeting at Sighthill, no place of
worship being nearer at hand. The Burtons'
family, for instance, whose forefathers had been
elders in the church for centuries, left at this time.
The story is told of Dr. Walker that while visiting
his parishioners for the purpose of catechising
them, asked an old, stern presbyterian " Who made
Paul a preacher ? " " It wasna ' My Lord Lauder-
dale ' " replied the worthy with a grim smile. The
Doctor was an exceeding prim gentleman, his wig
always being in perfect order, the ladies of the
congregation once observing a moth net protruding
from his pocket accused him of carrying curling-
tongs. He was Professor of Natural Philosophy in
the Edinburgh University.

Mr. John Fleming 1804-1823. Mr. Fleming was a
very different kind of a man from his predecessor —
more of the rough farmer type. The beautiful
garden which had been laid out according to the
scientific ideas of Dr. Walker, was soon transformed
back again to the more practical brakes of potatoes
and cabbage. Yet Mr. Fleming was, in every sense
of the word, a benefactor to the parish, for besides
leaving a large number of books, mostly theological,

56 HISTORY OF COLINTON PARISH.

to the parish school library, a handsome present in
itself, he left the sum of two hundred and forty
pounds for the education of poor boys and girls in
the parish. The following is an extract of his will
relative to this : — Inter alia " First, to set apart
two hundred and forty pounds stg. from my funds
to be invested in the name of the minister and
kirk-session of the parish of Collington jointly, the
annual interest of which to be applied under the
patronage and direction for the time of the five
resident farmers within the parish of Collington
whose individual rents on leases of nineteen years
or upwards are of greatest amount, in paying the
expense of the education of boys and girls, the
children of poor parents in said parish at the
parochial school, in reading, writing, and arithmetic,
no child to be on the foundation more than three
years." The bequest, being of an educational
nature, is now administered by the School Board,
and is known as the " Fleming Fund." For further
information relating to the lives of Dr. Walker and
Mr. Fleming, see Dr. Murray's " Annals of the
Parish."

The Rev. Lewis Balfour, D.D., 1823-1860. Dr.
Balfour was the third son of John Balfour,
Merchant in Edinburgh and Leith, by his wife,
Jean Whytt, the second daughter of Dr. Robert
Whytt of Bennochy, Professor of Medicine in the
University of Edinburgh. Lewis was born on the

CHURCHES. 57

30th of April 1777, in what was then No. 3 Princes
Street, Edinburgh, at the east side of what is now
the Waverley stairs.

In 1793 Lewis Balfour was apprenticed to a
merchant in Leith for three years, but owing to the
closing of the continental ports, followed by the
failure of his master, the only advantage he gained
was a knowledge of business habits, which was,
however, of service to him in after life.

He was seized with a spitting of blood in 1796,
and in October of that year was sent to spend the
winter in the Isle of Wight. While there he
became a volunteer, like every one else at that
time, and was an eye-witness of that most
important scene — The Mutiny at the Nore. Dr.
Balfour repeatedly sailed through the fleet at that
time, and actually saw the mutineers land a man
and his chest on the beach for immoral conduct, — a
striking instance of the order and discipline
maintained by the men, and one that helped to
allay the alarm at first universally prevalent.
Indeed, so chivalrous were those mutineers that, on
a report that the French had put to sea, they
offered the Government to receive back their
officers, fight the French, and settle their differences
afterwards.

In 1779 Dr. Balfour commenced the usual course
of studies in Divinity, and was licensed as a
preacher on the 30th of January 1805. In March

58 HISTORY OF COLINTON PARISH.

1806 he received a presentation to Sorn, a large and
populous parish in Ayrshire, thus entering on the
important duties of the ministry at the mature age
of twenty-nine, which he was spared to discharge
for the long period of fifty-three years. His settle-
ment at Sorn was the last that took place accord-
ing to the old form — the presbytery requiring the
parishioners to petition for the presentee after
hearing him preach before proceeding to moderate
the call.

On the 28th of August 1823, just seventeen
years to a day since his first ordination at Sorn, Dr.
Balfour was admitted to the church and parish
of Colinton. His unwearied attention to the
permanent interests of the people of Sorn was so
highly appreciated that upon his transfer to
Colinton they presented him with a very handsome
bookcase with a suitable inscription — " Esteeming
him very highly in love for his work's sake."

The ignoring of sect in a community of aim
always kept Dr. Balfour on good terms with all
around him, whether lay or clerical., even during
and after the exciting periods of the voluntary and
Free Church controversies — for he never allowed a
difference in views of church government to inter-
fere with personal friendships. So highly was this
truly Christian spirit appreciated that when in
1856 he was presented by the whole body of
parishioners with a handsome gift, commemorative

CHURCHES. 59

of his having completed the fiftieth year of his
ministry and thirty-fourth of his connection with
the parish of Colinton, the names of every denomin-
ation were to be found among the subscribers.

Dr. Balfour closed his pulpit ministrations on the
15th of April 1860 with the sermon from the
striking text " Amen." He was taken ill on the
19th April and died on the 24th after being only
one day in bed. He was buried in Colinton
Churchyard in the presence of a large concourse of
parishioners on the 30th of April 1860, the 83rd
anniversary of his birth. An amusing story is told
of the Kev. Doctor and John Dodds, who was the
Doctor's " man," and who seems to have been like
many of that fraternity, a worthy. The story is
told that one day John, with an assistant, had to
open a grave in the Foulis' vault, by no means a
pleasant job, and, of course, was a perfect excuse for
John enjoying to some degree his favourite receipt
" for a' ills " which he appears to have done, for
when the Doctor came upon them, while enjoying
his usual stroll, they were both lying very drunk in
the bottom of the vault. Upon seeing them in
such a condition the Doctor looked down upon
them in his usual kind and forgiving way and
said : — " Really, John, I think it is time you should

repent. The time " but. Doctor," interrupted

John, knowing a severe admonition was about to be
his, " did ye no tell us no further gane than

60 HISTORY OF COLINTON PARISH.

Sawbbath that there was no repentance in the
grave ? " John was incorrigible.

Dr. Balfour was married to Henrietta Scott
Smith, third daughter of the Rev. George Smith,
D.D., of Galston, Ayrshire, by whom he had a
family of thirteen — nine sons and four daughters.
The youngest, Margaret Isabella, married, as
already mentioned, Thomas Stevenson, the well
known marine engineer, and their only child was
the still better known novelist — Robert Louis
Stevenson.

The degree of Doctor of Divinity was conferred
upon Mr. Balfour by the University of Glasgow in
December 1853.

Rev. William Lockhart, D.D., 1861. Dr. Lock-
hart, who had been Parish Minister of South
Queensferry, was inducted as the Minister of
Colinton Parish on the lltli day of January 1861,
and has for the long period of now forty years
discharged the duties of that office. Being the
first Minister of Colinton appointed by popular
vote. Dr. Lockhart, besides having done much
research in connection with the Parish Church
here, published, in 1889, a book called " The Church
of Scotland in the Thirteenth Century," and also,
in 1892, a volume of sermons written " For a season
of sorrow," both of which have had a wide circula-
tion.

The degree of Doctor of Divinity was conferred

CHURCHES, 61

on Mr, Lockhart by the University of St, Andrews
in February 1893,

The Doctor was chairman of the Parochial Board
for many years, having succeeded Lord Dunfermline
in 1869, he continued to hold that office unre-
mittingly until 1894, when the Parish Council was
instituted.

The tranquility of the Parochial Board meetings
were often disturbed by smart (?) business men
from Edinburgh, who happened to be members, and
who came occasionally, but whose actions did not
altogether eclipse the intelligence of the parish. A
certain member on one occasion wished humbly to
move the non-approval of the minutes of a previous
meeting, but was ordered to sit down by Dr.
Lockhart, being told that his conduct was extra-
ordinary. In vain he assured the chairman that
such was an ordinary course at Edinburgh Town
Council, The Doctor, with a frown, told him that
that body did many a foolish thing,

Dr, Lockhart took a great interest also in the
educational well-being of the parish, and was Chair-
man of the School Board for many years.

SLATEFORD UNITED FREE CHURCH.

This congregation dates from 1782. In that
year some parishioners of Corstorphine petitioned

62 HISTORY OF COLINTON PARISH.

the Associate (Burgher) Presbytery of Edinburgh
for supply of preaching. Report has it that their
anti-ritualistic principles resented the introduction
of the Paraphrases into the Parish Kirk. In their
application, however, they plead on broader
evangelical grounds, " the want of the due adminis-
tration of the Gospel in that corner." They met for
a time at Sighthill. Afterwards they rented a
building, and then erected a church and manse at
Slateford. There, in the following year, they were
joined by a company of Colinton parishioners who
had been offended by the presentation of the Parish
Church to Dr. Walker. A contingent of the
Cameronian congregation at Pentland, then vacant,
also threw in their lot with the infant cause.
Thus from the beginning it had in it these elements
of religious conservatism combined with a desire
for ecclesiastical liberty which marked the first
century of Scottish dissent.

The spot selected for the church was strategically
suitable, not far from the city and yet with a wide
rural radius. It was also romantically beautiful.
No hideous canal and railway embankment and
bridges then hemmed in, and crushed out of sight,
the hamlet.

The first two ministers of the congregation were
somewhat famous men. The choice of them
indicates no ordinary capacity and discrimination
on the part of the members.

CHURCHES. 63

The Rev. John Dick, son of a Burgher minister
of Aberdeen, was ordained in October 1786. He
was only 21, but ere many years had passed he
came into j)rominence both as a theologian and
ecclesiastical leader. In 1800 he preached a series
of sermons on the " evidences of Christianity," the
outcome of the dispute which had been going on in
the denomination between the " Auld Lichts " and
" New Lichts " regarding the obligation of the
Covenant. His mother, then a widow, was residing
with him at the manse ; she urged him to publish
the sermons. He consented, and they appeared in
the form of the " Essay on Inspiration," which at
once brought the author into the front rank of
contemporary divines. In 1801 he was translated
to Shuttle St. (now Grey friars), Glasgow, one of the
premier churches of the body. In 1820 he was
appointed Professor of Divinity as successor to Dr.
Lawson of Selkirk, " the Scottish Socrates," when
in the same year the Secession Church was formed
by the union of the Burgher and anti-Burgher. Dr.
Dick was continued in the same high office till his
death in 1833.

In the beginning of his pastorate at Slateford the
young minister laid out the manse garden with
great neatness and beauty, adding to the natural
attractiveness of the spot not a few of the em-
bellishments of art. A holly tree, planted by him,
grew to an immense size. It was in recent years

b* HISTORY OF COLINTON PARISH.

diminished in bulk, and at last altogether cut down
as it darkened the manse. But it has begun to
sprout again with undiminished vitality.

The Rev. John Belfrage was ordained to the
charge of the now large and flourishing congrega-
tion of Slateford in 1802. Though less known to
ecclesiastical fame, he was a man of even more
remarkable personality than his predecessor. His
whole ministry was spent in Slateford. Having
studied medicine, he graduated as M.D., and added
the cure of bodies to the cure of souls. He died at
Rothesay in May 1833, and lies buried, along with
liis only sou, in Colinton Churchyard. Dr. John
Brown, in his " Horae Subsecivae " (letter to Dr.
Cairns), refers to him at some length. He says of
him : " Dr. Belfrage was a great man in posse if
ever I saw one — a " village Hampden." Greatness
was of his essence : nothing paltry, nothing

secondary, nothing untrue His strong will and

authority, his capacious, clear, and beneficent
intellect, dwelt in its petty sphere like an oak in a
flower-pot." He goes on to record one of the most
extraordinary instances of the power of will under
the pressure of aflfection I ever heard of. Dr.
Belfrage was twice married. His second wife, who
was a woman of great sweetness, died after less
than a year. There was no portrait of her. He
resolved there should be one, and, though utterly
ignorant of drawing, he determined to do it himself.

CHURCHES. 65

He got the materials for miniature painting, and, I
tliink, eiglit prepared ivory plates. He then shut
himself up from everyone and from everything for
fourteen days, and came out of his room, wasted
and feeble, with one of the plates (the others he
had used and burned), on which was a portrait full
of subtle likeness, drawn and coloured in a way no
one could have dreamed of, having had such an
artist. I do not, as I said before, know anything
more remarkable in the history of human sorrow
and resolve.

" Rab " tells another story of the redoubtable
" Doctor." It was during the first election after
the first Reform Bill, when Sir John Dalrymple,
afterwards Lord Stair, was canvassing the county
of Midlothian. The candidate was walking with
the minister in the manse garden. Sir John was
anxious and gracious ; Dr Belfrage, like many
ministers in his denomination, was a thorough-
going Liberal. But partly from his natural sense
of humour and relish of power, he was putting the
Baronet through his facings with some strictness,
opening upon him with startling views, and ending
by asking him '• Are you, Sir John, for free trade in
corn, free trade in education, free trade in religion ?
I am." " Well, Doctor," said Sir John, " I have
heard of free trade in corn but never in the other
two." " You'll hear of them before many years are
gone, Sir John, or I'm mistaken."
E

66 HISTORY OF COLINTON PARISH.

An interesting episode in Dr. Belfrage's history
is his befriending of Robert Pollok, author of the
" Course of Time," who resided for some time at
Slateford manse under the care of the pastor-
physician.

The portraits of Dr. Dick and Dr. Belfrage hang
in the Synod Buildings, Castle Terrace ; the latter
painted by Mungo Burton, Colinton.

The subsequent history of the congregation can
be briefly obtained by the names of its ministers, as
follows : —

Rev. Wm. Thomson of Paisley, ordained 1833,
died October 1875 ; Eev. Wm. Munsie, translated
from Glasgow, May 1869, resigned July 1885 ; Rev.
G. S. Muir, M.A., of Leith, translated from Grange,
Banffshire, April 1886, resigned owing to ill-health,
November 1898 ; Rev. J. S. Calderwood, M.A., of
Oban, ordained 1899.

During the latter years of Mr. Thomson's
ministry, and during the subsequent period, the
congregation dwindled. Other churches, planted
round about, absorbed members actual and possible.
At one time it almost looked as if the sturdy
Burgher Bush, planted in 1782, would, unlike that
of its ancestral motto, be burned and consumed.
But, like Dr. Dick's holly tree, it has in recent
years shown signs of taking root downwards
again. It is to be hoped that, under the ministry
recently begun, it will visibly flourish both in

CHURCHES. 67

leaf and fruit, to be an influence of great good in
the villapfe and district.

CRAIGLOCKHART PARISH CHURCH.

In the year 1880 an iron church was bought by
the Rev. Dr. Stevenson of St. George's, Edinburgh,
and R. A. Macfie, Esq., of Dreghorn, and planted
near the gate of Craiglockhart House. It was
meant as a place of worship for Slateford and its
neighbourhood in the parish of Colinton, and for
Saughton and Gorgie in the parish of St. Cuthbert's.
It was opened for divine service on November 20th.
In the same year, on October 14th, the memorial
stone of the present building was laid by Lord
Balfour of Burleigh, and the church was opened for
worship on March 27th, 1890. It was made a
Chapel of Ease in 1894, and erected into a Parish
Quoad Sacra on the 10th December 1897.

Immediately after its erection, A. Oliver Riddell,
Esq., of Craiglockhart, one of the trustees of the
church, most generously offered, on behalf of Mrs.
Riddell and himself, to make the improvements and
additions which have recently been completed.
These have made the church, which at first was a
very plain building, at once attractive and comfort-
able. The tower and spire, on which there is much
fine carved work, is now a conspicuous and striking

68 HISTORY OF COLINTON PARISH.

feature in the landscape from whatever point of
view it is seen. For their great liberality Mr. and
Mrs. Riddell deserve the warmest thanks, not only
of the congregation but of the whole church. The
work was intrusted to Messrs. Hay & Henderson,
Architects, from whose design the church was
built. It is of the 15th century style of Scottish
architecture. The fine window in the east end of
the church was the gift of Maurice I. Lothian, Esq.,
of Redwood, Spylaw Road, Edinburgh. The Rev.
R. W. Mackersy has been minister of the church
from its commencement.

A dedication service was held in the church on
Friday, June 9th 1899, at which a Tablet was
placed in the porch of the church. The inscription
on it runs thus : —

This plate

Is placed here by

the Congregation,

In grateful commemoration of

the liberality of

Alexander Oliver Riddell,

Esquire, of Craiglockhart,

and of his wife,

Jean Fazackerly Hornby,

who erected the

tower and spire,

and made other

generous gifts to this Church.

Anno Domini 1898.

CHURCHES. 69

ST. MARGARET'S, JUNIPER GREEN.

The congregation of St. Margaret's dates from
1892. During the preceding year the members
and adherents of the Church of Scotland residing
in Juniper Green, feeling the urgent need of a place
of worship in the village, inaugurated a movement
for the erection of a church. A committee was
formed, and the consent of the Minister of the
parish being obtained, the Presbytery of Edinburgh
was approached and that Court heartily sanctioned
the scheme. The Home Mission Committee was
applied to for a grant, and responded to the appli-
cation by voting not merely an unusual sum
towards the maintenance of ordinances, but also
£100 towards the cost of the erection of a tem-
porary place of worship. As a result of the steps
taken, an iron church which had previously served
the congregation of Craiglockhart and which was
placed by the Presbytery at the disposal of the
Juniper Green committee, was opened in February
1892. Shortly before the opening, the committee
charged with the selection of a Minister unani-
mously recommended the appointment of the Rev.
Charles Maurice Short of King's Cavil, in the
Presbytery of Linlithgow. Mr. Short had been
for several years Minister of King's Cavil, and
before his ordination to that charge was Assistant

70 HISTORY OF COLINTON PAEISH.

to the Minister of Linlithgow. The sanction of the
Home Mission having been obtained to this appoint-
ment, the church was opened and the new Minister
introduced to his charge on the same day, 21st
February 1892, by the Rev. Geo. Mathieson, D.D.
of St. Bernard's, Edinburgh,

At the first dispensation of the communion held
within a Sabbath or two from the opening there
were present 86 communicants. Very soon the
usual agencies in connection with a congregation
were in operation, and things moved on so suc-
cessfully that on the first Saturday of June 1895,
the foundation stone of the new church of St.
Margaret's was laid by His Grace the Lord High
Commissioner of that year, the Marquis of Bread-
albane.

On 23rd January 1897 the church was opened
by the Rev. the Moderator of the Assembly, Dr.
Scott of St. George's, Edinburgh.

In style, it is early Gothic, and consists of nave,
aisles, transepts, and chancel. A fine memorial
window, presented by Councillor Murray, one of the
chief promoters of the original movement for the
church, is placed in the chancel, and the building
is justly regarded as being one of the handsomest
in the neighbourhood of Edinburgh. The chaste
oak pulpit stands at the end of the nave and the
north side of the transept and a fine baptismal font
occupies a place near the pulpit.

CHURCHES. 71

When the debt is cleared, steps will be taken to
get the church made into a Quoad Sacra Parisli
Church. It has at present the status of a Chapel
of Ease, a constitution having been granted by the
General Assembly of 1898.

JUNIPER GREEN UNITED FREE CHURCH.

The evangelical revival under Dr. Chalmers and
others culminated in 1843. That was the year of
the Disruption of the Scottish Church. In Colinton,
Dr. Balfour was expected to " come out " but did
not. Two of his elders, Sir James Forrest of
Comiston and Mr. Adam Penman, Bonaly, left the
Establishment and adhered to the New Free Pro-
testing Church. In Currie, Dr. Robert Jamieson
was also expected to join the out-going party but
remained in, and those of his church who did come
out joined with the Colinton protesters. Services
for the Sabbath were organised in Bryce's Hall,
Currie, and in the old ball-room, Colinton. Various
prominent men in the ministry made visits and
conducted the services. At length, after a year
or so, the Rev. Harry Anderson who had been
Assistant to the Rev. Dr. Thorburn of Leith, was
elected to the office of Pastor and was duly
ordained in Bryce's Hall, Currie. After the or-
dination the congregation fell into a procession

72 HISTORY OF COLINTON PARISH.

and walked from Currie to Kates Mill, where
they were joined by others. The whole party sat
down to the ordination dinner in a large room near
the finishing house at the mill. Mr. Anderson's
ministry was exercised amidst difficulties. He was
a powerful preacher, wise and energetic, but some-
what lengthy. For twenty-five years his ministry
lasted. A paralytic shock in the pulpit \vas the
first disablement, and ultimately he retired to Edin-
burgh, where he died. He was unmarried, and his
sisters kept house with him. The church was
built in his time, was doubled roofed with a row
of wooden pillars down the middle. Lord Cockburn
sat on the Minister's left hand. His daughter, who
became the wife of the Rev. Dr. Stewart of
Leghorn, was a very active worker in the church.
The foundation stone of the church was laid by
Sir James Forrest, Bart, of Comiston (Lord Provost
of Edinburgh) and an elder in the congregation.
Mr. Constable, the publisher, was also an elder and
a useful one, and Mr. Gray of Currie held a similar
office. Altogether the plucky little congregation
went forward splendidly and with much heartiness.
Of the Misses Anderson of the (Jottage, Colinton,
who joined with their widowed mother at the Dis-
ruption, two still survive in its membership and
their services to the congregation have been beyond
praise. Mr. George Murray Porteous, who was with
the Church from the beginning, has rendered much

Colinton and Gurrie Free Church.
(From, a Water Colour by F. Sohns.)

74 HISTORY OF COLINTON PARISH.

help in the various offices, and others, of whom
a few still survive in esteem and honour.

The Rev. Charles M'Neil was the next Minister.
His father was a Minister near the Mull of Galloway,
and he himself was Assistant in Fountainbridge
Free Church, Edinburgh.

The present church was built in his day, being in
every way worthy, and reflects great credit on the
promoters of the building. Mr. M'Neil was an
active man and a good Pastor. He was Minister
for twelve years and then removed to Free St.
George's, Dumfries.

Mr. Gladstone's voice was the first heard in the
renovated church. During the first famous Mid-
lothian Campaign in 1879-80, the church which
was not seated or occupied for worship was filled
to the doors and windows with an eager crowd to
hear the venerable statesman.

The vacancy was prolonged for a year, and at
length the Rev. Hugh Falconer, B.D., who had
preached some months before as a student, was
elected and ordained. He was a native of New-
haven and a Cunningham Fellow of the New
College, and was travelling and studying abroad at
the time. He was a man of high gifts, a philo-
sopher and poet, widely read, and was possessed
with a rich voice, which gTeatly enhanced his
preaching. In 1892 he was elected to succeed the
Rev. Dr. James Hartings at Jesmond Presbyterian

CHURCHES. 75

Church, Newcastle, where he now ministers to a
large and influential congregation.

Early in 1893 the Rev. Norman Campbell
Macfarlane, who had been unanimously elected, was
inducted to the pastorate. He had been eight
years settled at Cruden, in Aberdeenshire, and was
called from there ; previously he had held assistant-
ships in Mayfield and Warrender Park, Edinburgh.
Under him the membership has largely increased,
and the congregation is well organised and in
hearty working order.

THE EPISCOPAL CHURCH OF
ST. CUTHBERT.

The Episcopal Church of St. Cuthbert, standing
in its pretty grounds at Colinton, must attract the
attention of every passer by. Built ten years ago
by the congregation from the design of Dr. Rowand
Anderson, and since added to and beautifully
decorated by the generosity of Mr. and Mrs. Oliver
Riddell of Craiglockhart, is a very interesting
example of a variety of Scottish Gothic architecture.
It consists of nave, chancel, transept, side chapel,
vestry, and tower containing a peal of three bells
presented by the members of the congregation,
there being at present 115 resident communicants.

76 HISTORY OF COLINTON PARISH.

Inside, the church has been adorned by painting
and carved oak screens and pulpit, all of which has
been beautifully picked out in gold and colours,
and the result is very striking. In the nave there
is a lovely specimen of the work of Mr. Holiday in
the window placed by Mrs. Auldjo Jamieson as a
memorial to her eldest son, whose accidental death
a few years ago called forth such widely felt sorrow.
The church is a striking and cliarming feature in
the landscape, the congregation forming an im-
portant element in the religious and social life of
the parish. The Rev. X. Peel Massy, B. A., has been
clergyman since the beginning.

^lyapiev IV.

BIOGRAPHICAL.

" The wisest man could ask no more of fate
Than to be simple, modest, manly, true."

Arnold.

)T is but natural, that after raising your
curiosity so far, that you should expect
from me something biographical as an
indispensable appendage to a sketch
such as this. I am afraid, however, that anything
that I can say must necessarily be desultory and
unchronological.

The idea must therefore be to throw what light
I can upon the persons to whom the principal
property of the parish may have belonged at one
time or another. For though I know that few
rural parishes can boast of so many distinguished
men having had connection with it, a continuous
biography would be for me quite impossible, and
perhaps not desirable.

The old castle of Colinton, now a decorative ruin
on the Colinton House estate, was bought by Sir
James Foulis in 1519 from Lord Kilmaurs "for
certain sums of money paid to me by the said

78 HISTORY OF COLINTON PARISH.

James, and other thanks and gratuities done and to
be done by him to me." The barony then com-
prehended the lands of Swanston, Dreghorn,
Bonaly, the Brewlands of Cohnton, Badds, Pilmuir
Oxgangs, Comiston, the estate of Lymphoy in
Currie parish, and sometime afterwards also the
estates of Craiglockhart, Newmains, and Bow-
bridge.

This extensive landowner had married Agnes
Heriot of Lymphoy, whose tombstone is still in
good preservation in the aisle of the Parish Church
here, and bears the following inscription : — Here
lyes ane Honorabil Woman, A. Heriot, spous to J.
Foulis of Colintoun, vas quha. Died 8 August
1593.*

In 1528 James Foulis was made King's Advocate,
and Clerk Register in 1531. He was concerned in
all the public transactions of his time, and was one
of the commissioners appointed in 1543 to negotiate
a marriage then proposed betwixt Mary Queen of
Scots and Prince Edward of England.

He was succeeded by his son Alexander, who

* Directly below the floor of the church here, is the vault
belonging to the Foulis family, and —

" Perchance, all thoughtless as they tread
The hollow-sounding floor
Of that dark house of kindred dead,
Which shall, as heretofore.
In turn receive to silent rest,
Another and another guest."

BIOGRArHICAL. 79

was created a Baronet in 1634, who was again
succeeded by his son Sir James. This Sir James,
who had espoused the Royal cause during the time
of the Protectorate, had his large estate plundered
and his numerous farms burned. The following
minute, which was read before Parliament after the
Restoration, will give an idea of the heavy losses
he sustained, and which alone were sufficient to
have ruined any family, and even the ample
resources of Sir James were severely put to test.
In fact, the comparative poverty to which this
patriotic man was reduced has kept his descendants
even until now labouring under the burden which
was then entailed : " The report underwritten was
presented and read in Parliament, whereof the
tenor follows : — The Earls of Dumfries and Callen-
dar, the Lord Garden and Commissioners for
Stirling and Ayr, appointed by the Lord Commis-
sioner His Grace and the Lords of the Article, to
take trial of the losses sustained by the Lord
Golintoun, do find that, in anno 1648, he disbursed
£6600 Scots (a £ Scots was 20d. stg.) of his own
proper money upon the levying of a regiment of
horse for His Majesty's service, and that by and
attour the great expense he was at after the defeat
of Preston. Item., finds by the testificate of several
gentlemen, his neighbours, that in the year 1650 he
had his whole tenants' houses, barns, byres, and
onsets in the town and lands of Craiglockhart and

80 HISTORY OF COLINTON PARISH.

Bowbridge totally burned by the usurper's army :
all which are estimated by the said gentlemen to
£4000 Scots. Item, it is certified by the said
gentlemen that he had his whole plenishing within
the manor place of Colintoun burnt or taken away
by the said usurper; and that all the doors and
windows, iron work, and much of the lofting and
roof, were burnt, pulled down, and destroyed, or
taken away by the said usurper : and that he had
several other houses, barns, and byres in Colintoun
burnt, and much of the planting cut, all estimate
by the said gentlemen at £10,000 Scots. Item,
that he had his whole corn and other stock upon
the mains of Colintoun then laboured and possessed
by himself and his own servants, all destroyed
and taken away ; estimate by the said gentlemen
at £3,033 Scots. Item, it is certified by a great
many gentlemen, heritors within the West-Kirk
Parish, and under their hands, that the said Lord
Colintoun, in the year 1650, had the manor house
of Bonnington, and the whole tenant houses, barns
and onsets belonging thereto, destroyed and burnt ;
estimate by the said gentlemen at £6,000. Item,
finds that w^hen he was taken prisoner at Eliot
[Forfarshire] there were taken from him in gold,
money, jewels and horses to the value of £3,000
Scots. Item, his whole estate being laid waste in
the years 1650 and 1651, as also sequestered by
the usurper, till the year 1654, his estate, then

BIOGRAPHICAL. 81

consisting of the barony of Colintoun, barony of
Ratlio and lands of Bonnington, being yearly
worth £12,200 Scots, conform to the rental pro-
duced, his loss of the said four years' rents,
defalking (excepting) £1,335 Scots, received out
of the lands of Ratho, together with £2000 Scots,
reckoned in the former article as one year's rent
of the parks and mains of Colintoun, amounts to
£45,033 Scots. Sum of the whole losses above
written extends to £77,666, and it is our humble
opinion that the said losses should be recorded
in the books of Parliament, which report being
taken into consideration by the Lord Commissioner
and estates of Parliament, they have appointed
and appoints the same to be recorded in the books
of Parliament."

At this time large parts of the estate, Dreghorn,
Comiston, New Mains, (now Colinton Mains) and
several other places were sold, the position of the
family being thereby seriously affected. Sir James
Foulis was called to the bench as Lord Collintoun.

The name " Foulis " is said to be of Norman
origin, a corruption of the old Roman " Fewllis,"
foliage, the armorial bearings being three bay
leaves. The family is now represented by that of
Woodhall in this parish.

About the year 1790 the house was occupied by
Sir William Forbes, of Pitsligo, a Banker in Edin-
burgh, of whom Sir Walter Scott writes, in the
F

82 HISTORY OF COLINTON PARISH.

introductory epistle to the Fourth Canto of
" Marmion,"

"Far may we search before we find
A heart so manly and so kind."

His son, the young Sir William, and Sir Walter
were however better acquainted. They had known
each other from childhood, and afterwards served
in a corps of volunteer cavalry, just before their
paths were to be crossed in a more delicate and
tender region.

You must remember the allusion which Lockhart
makes in his " Life of Scott " to a " first love "
which ended so unfortunate for the poet. We are
told how their acquaintance began in the Greyf riars'
Churchyard where rain happened to be falling
one Sunday after church-time. Scott offered his
umbrella to a young lady and the tender having
been accepted, escorted her to her home, which
proved to be at no great distance from his own.
To return from church together had, it seems,
grown into something like a custom before they
met in society, It then appeared that the mothers
of the two young people. Lady Jane Stewart and
Mrs. Scott had been companions in their youth,
though, both living secludedly they had scarcely
seen each other for many years. The two matrons
now renewed their former intercourse. For long
years Scott nourished this dream, but it was

BIOGRAPHICAL. 83

doomed to end in disappointment. ' Green-mantle '
preferred a friend of Scott's who was in this also
a rival, " a gentleman of the hio:hest character, to
whom some affectionate allusions occur in one
of the greatest of the poet's works, and who
lived to act the part of a most generous friend
to Scott throughout the anxieties and distresses
of 1826 and 1827." The lady was Williamina
Belches Stuart, and the more fortunate rival
was Sir William Forbes of Colinton House, who
married the lady whom Scott so loved. Lockhart
adds that he has no doubt that this deep dis-
appointment had a powerful influence in nerving
Scott's mind to those legal studies which were to fit
him for being called to the Bar." Some ingenious
observers have traced a result deeper and more
lasting. Keble, in a beautiful essay on Scott, more
than hints a belief that it was this imaginative
regret haunting Scott all his life long, which be-
came the wellspring of his inspiration in all his
minstrelsy and romance. Be that as it may, the
success of his rival seems to have made no break in
Scott's friendship with Forbes. About thirty years
afterwards, when Scott's fame was at its full, he
makes the following entry in his diary : — " 1826,
January 20, Sir William Forbes called, the same
kind honest friend as ever." Again in January 26,
" Sir William Forbes took the chair and behaved
as he has ever done with the generosity of ancient

84 HISTORY OF COLTNTON PARISH.

faith and early friendship. In what scenes have
Sir William and I not borne a share together,
desperate and almost bloody affrays, rivalries, deep
drinking matches — and finally with the kindest
feeling on both sides, somewhat separated by his
retiring much within the bosom of his family,
and I moving little beyond mine. It is fated
our planets should cross, and that at the periods
most interesting to me — down — down — a hundred
thoughts."

On hearing of the death of liis early friend,
Scott writes in a letter dated " Abbotsford, October
28, 1828. Your letter brought me the aflBicting
intelligence of the death of our early and beloved
friend Sir William. I had little else to expect
from the state of health in which he was when
I last saw him, but that circumstance does not
diminish the pain with which I now reflect that I
shall never see him more. He was a man, who,
from his habits could not be intimately known to
many, although everything he did partook of that
high feeling and generosity which belongs, perhaps,
to a better age than that we live in. In him I
feel I have sustained a loss which no after years of
my life can fill up to me : and if I look back to the
gay and happy hours of youth, they must be filled
with recollections of our departed friend. In the
whole course of life our friendship has been un-
interrupted, as his kindness has been unwearied.

BIOGRAPHICAL. 85

Even the last time I saw him (so changed from
what I knew him) he came to town when he was
fitter to have kept his room, merely because he
could be of use in some affairs of mine. It is
melancholy to reflect that the life of a man whose
principles were so excellent and his heart so
affectionate, should have, in the midst of external
prosperity, been darkened, and I fear shortened by
domestic affliction ; but those whom He loveth He
chasteneth." Then follow some reflections on the
thought of meeting departed friends hereafter,
somewhat more serious than Scott usually indulged
in. As far as we can find from his writings there
is but one allusion made by Sir Walter to the lady
who became Lady Forbes. In his diary, a year
before the above letter was written, 1827, while on
a visit to the neighbourhood, he drove over to
St. Andrews, not having seen it for many years,
and thus he describes it : — " I did not go up St.
Rule's Tower as on former occasions, this is a
falling oflT, for when before did I remain sitting
below when there was a steeple to ascend. . . .
I sat down on a gravestone, and recollect the first
visit I made to St. Andrews, now thirty years ago.
What changes in my feelings and my fortunes
have since taken place ! — some for the better,
many for the worse, I remember the name I then
carved in Runic characters beside the castle-gate,
and asked why it should still agitate my heart.

86 HISTORY OF COLINTON PARISH.

but my friends came down from the tower and the
foolish idea was chased away." What the name
was can easily be guessed. The old sexton rejoiced
to point out the spot within the roofless tower of
St. Rule where Sir Walter sat on the stone " with
a rough hairy cap on his head."

The marriage of Sir William Forbes and Willia-
mina Belches Stuart took place on the 19th January
1797. Their family consisted of four sons and two
daughters. Lady Forbes unfortunately died shortly
after the birth of the youngest child, James David^
who became the Principal of the United College
in the University of St. Andrews, and also Professor
of Natural Philosophy in the University of Edin-
burgh, whose life, written jointly by Professors
Sharp, Tait, and Adams-Reilly, affords hours of
the purest enjoyment.

" He shall be like a tree that grows
Near planted by a river,
Which in his season yields his fruit,
And his leaf fadeth never."

So says our old version of the Psalms with
respect to the righteous man, and James David
Forbes was a righteous man, whose mind yielded
precious fruit and whose leaves will never fade.

In December 1830 this old family home of the
Forbes at Colinton was broken up, removing with
his two sisters to Edinburo-h.

BIOGRAPHICAL. 87

Forbes thus records his feelings at the change.
" We are about to leave this delightful and en-
deared spot — endeared by its beauties and comfort
by long habit, by the associations of childhood
and youth, and by the tenderest recollections of
riper years. So deeply and heavily has this
event pressed upon me ever since I saw its necessity,
that I am almost ashamed to confess the weakness
of my feelings connected with inanimate objects.''

Thus experiencing the pain which has been the
lot of so many in every generation —

" We leave the well-beloved place,
Where first we gazed upon the sky ;
The roof that heard our earliest cry,
Will shelter one of stranger race."

Professor Forbes was a man who would have
shrunk from any unnecessary manifestation of his
religious feelings, still it is due to the cause of
truth in this scientific sceptical age to record the
unquestioning submission of Forbes to the will of
God, and the same lowly acceptance in the merits
of a crucified Saviour. The heights in the scientific
world to which he reached never seemed to have
disturbed or cast a shadow of a doubt over his
faith, and the bridge-building of reconciliation
between religion and science, such as is so common
now-a-days was totally absent in him. The picture
which Bishop Forbes draws of his death-bed scene

88 HISTORY OF COLINTON PARISH.

is altogether beautiful. " Now minister to me,
he would say after a conversation on the things of
the world, and then he would have prayers said to
him. Night after night it was so ; but the most
touching scene of all was, when the door was
opened between the two sick-rooms (his daughter
being also on her death-bed) a temporary altar
fitted up and the divine mysteries celebrated. The
rites were indeed maimed, the invalids being too
weak to hear the entii'e service, but those who
knelt at that lowly table will never forget the
devotion of those who communicated these blessed
days." Such is the hallowed power and sacred
influences of which our Scottish bard bore testimony
when he penned the immortal words —

" From scenes like these old Scotia's grandeur springs,
That makes her loved at home, revered abroad."

The old Castle, though only a part of what it
once has been, may be studied with much interest
as a specimen of the baronial castle in the early
part of the fifteenth century, when at once a
mansion and a stronghold, combining beauty and
comfort with strength and security against enemies.

Crossing the low doorway one stands a few
moments in the old kitchen, up the wide chimney
of which, now black and cold, great fires once
blazed and crackled. Then a peep into the other
rooms — long, low, narrow, gloomy places, and after

BIOGRAPBICAL. 89

a moment or two turn away with a shudder.
Ascending a narrow winding stair we are brought
up to what would be the principal rooms, all
arousing the interest and claiming the attention.
From the large window in front we may gaze
down on what was once the court-yard, and as we
stand here in this deserted ruin the present is for a
time forgotten, fancy wanders back to the days
when the old castle was the abode of the great
and the gay ; when the walls rang with sounds of
mirth and revelry, and from its court-yard many a
merry band rode forth to the tournament and the
chase.

In front of this old and interesting edifice stands
a holly hedge which forms two squares encircling
what was at one time the flower gardens. The
hedge, which is the rendezvous of thousands of the
feathered tribe at night, is said to be the largest in
Scotland, standing over forty feet high, and is over
twenty-five feet through, and supposed to have
been planted some three hundred years ago. A few
yards to the east stands the westei-n gable of what in
Roman Catholic times must have been the chapel
or oratory. Mostly all mansion houses had their
private domestic chapel in those days. It has
two little windows which have been described as
' anries,' from which would be distributed charities
to the poor. This, however, cannot be as they are
not out through the wall. They were more pro-

90 HISTORY OF COLINTON PARISH.

bably used for holding rosaries, etc., used in the
Roman Catholic form of worship. You may
remember that Mrs. Oliphant makes this " vacant
threshold " the scene of one of the widest known
of modern ghost stories.

Mr. Henry Hallam in his " View of the State
of Europe from the Middle Ages," says — " The
domestic buildings occupied by families of con-
sideration would not seem very spacious or con-
venient, far less would this luxurious generation
be content with their internal accommodations. It
is an error to suppose that the English gentry were
lodged in stately or even well-sized houses. A
gentleman's house containing three or four beds
was extraordinary well provided, few contained
more than two. The walls were commonly bare,
without wainscot, or even plaster, except that some
great houses were furnished with hangings, and
that probably hardly so soon as the reign of
Edward IV. It is unnecessary to add, that neither
libraries of books nor pictures could have found
a place among furniture. A few inventories of
furniture that still remain exhibit a miserable
deficiency. It is in this sense, probably that we
must understand (Eucas Sylvius, if he meant
anything more than to express a traveller's dis-
comfort when he declares that the King of Scotland
would rejoice to be as well lodged as the second
class citizens of Nuremburg. Few burghers of that

BIOGRAPHICAL. 91

town had mansions, I presume, equal to the palaces
of Dunfermline or Stirling ; but it is not unlikely
that they were better furnished."

The modern seat at present inhabited by Colonel
Trotter stands on a beautiful eminence overhanging
the village of Colinton, was built by the first Sir
William Forbes, who unfortunately died just as it
neared completion in 1806. It then became the
residence of Lord Dunfermline, who was some
years Speaker in the House of Commons, and son
of the famous General Sir Ralph Abercrombie.* A
tale of a very different flavour, yet racy of the
spot, is attached to the beechen avenue that leads
to the village. Thither one pleasant Sabbath
morninjj before church-time had sauntered Lord
Dunfermline in his smoking-cap and dressing-

* "There was something remarkable," writes one of his
contemporaries, " in the family of Sir Ralph Abercrombie.
The father, who was born in 1704, lived to see his four sons,
honoured and respected at the head of their professions.
While his eldest son. Sir Ralph, was Commander-in-Chief in
the West Indies, his second son, Sir Robert, held the same
position in the East : Lord Abercrombie, the third son, was
an eminent, learned and virtuous Judge, and the fourth died
in possession of an independent fortune, acquired in the
service of the East India Company. Three of his daughters
were married to gentlemen of family and fortune who resided
so near him that he could dine with either any day he chose,
and the fourth daughter continued unmarried, devoted her
days to the declining years of her father, who died in his
97th year."

92 HISTORY OF COLINTON PARISH.

gown, and prone on the path before him lay a
tipsy Edinburgh tailor clad in orthodox black, who
raised himself from the gutter upon his elbow, and
reproachfully addressed the statesman — " Do ye no
think shame, desecratin the Sawbath wi' sic claes ? "
He was succeeded by his son, also Lord Dun-
fermline, Minister Plenipotentiary to the Court of
the Netherlands, and who was father to the
present Hon. Mrs. Trotter.

DREGHORN.

To the south stands the stately, modern residence
of Dreghorn Castle. The names of some of the
residences such as Dreghorn, Woodhall and Redhall
are very old. Amongst the missing crown charters
of Robert II. was one confirming a lease of the
barony of Redhall in the shire of Edinburgh, " except
Dreghorn and Woodhall " by Alexander Meyaners
of Woodhall, to the Earl of Fife and Monteith.
Dreghorn was built by Sir W. Murray, master of
works to King Charles II. In the early part of
the eighteenth century it was the property of a
family called Pitcairn. In the churchyard here
a tomb belonging to the Dreghorn estate bore the
following inscription, it is now quite illegible.
" Here lyes Mr. David Pitcairn of Dreghorn, who
departed this life 27th January 1709 and of his

BIOGRAPHICAL. ' 93

age the 60th year, leaving behind him Mary-
Anderson, his wife, with five sons and seven
daughters by her." Mr. Pitcairn, who was a
Writer to the Signet in Edinburgh must have
resided much on the property and to have taken
a deep interest in all parochial matters connected
with the parish, and enjoying to a large degree
the respect and confidence of the parishioners,
being the ruling elder in the Parish Church for
many years.

" Perhaps no private gentleman was ever the
progenitor of so many persons remarkable in them-
selves, or who, by inter-marriage, formed such high
connections as to rank, intellectual abilities and
acknowledged public service," as Mr. Pitcairn. One
of his grand-daughters became the wife of Patrick
Brydone of that ilk.

He was succeeded to the estate by his eldest son
Patrick, who followed the same profession as his
father, and who sold the estate to a gentleman
named Hume in 1715.

David Malloch or Mallet, a poet and miscellaneous
writer, was tutor for many years to the children of
Mr. Hume of Dreghorn. Of his career from youth
to manhood, nothing certain is known, as in after
life, either through pride or prejudice, he studiously
endeavoured to conceal his true name and origin.
In 1723 Malloch's pleasing ballad of " William and
Margaret," written at Dreghorn, appeared. The

94 HISTORY OF COLINTON PARISH.

beauty of the production was so highly praised,
that it inspired him with courage to apply himself
closely to his poetical studies. In 1728 he pro-
duced a poem under the title of " The Excursion."
It is a collection of poetical landscape sketches,
with some skill and elegance, in imitation of
Thomson's " Seasons," but much inferior.

About this time Mallet, through the recommen-
dation of his friends, had the good fortune to be
appointed under-secretary to His Royal Highness,
Frederick, Prince of Wales.

In 1742 Mallet made a considerable addition to
his fortune by marriage. He had already buried
one wife, by whom he had several children, but of
her there is no account. His second choice was
Miss Lucy Estol, with whom he received a fortune,
and hence becoming either indifferent or lazy, he
allowed seven years to pass without favouring the
public with anything from his pen. When at
length his " Hermit " 1749 appeared, on the merits
of which critics were much divided. Then " A
Plain Man " 1756, " Elvira," 1757. Mallet had the
happiness of a wife who had much " faith." She
" believed " that her husband was the greatest poet
and wit of the age. Sometimes she would seize
his hand and kiss it with rapture, and if the looks
of a friend expressed any surprise, would apologize
that it was the dear hand that wrote those divine
poems. She was lamenting to a lady how much

BIOGRAPHICAL. 95

the reputation of her husband suffered by his name
being so frequently confounded with that of Dr.
Smollett. The lady answered " Madam, there is a
sh^'t remedy, let your husband keep his own
napie." Proof of the silly vanity and weakness of
this well-matched pair will be found in " Johnston's
Lives of the Poets." In a declininof state of health
Mallet went, accompanied by his wife, to the south
of France, but finding no improvement he returned
to England and died in 1765.

The estate of Dreghorn has changed hands so
often that it is difficult to give a record. After Mr.
Hume, came one Dalrymple, then Dr. St. Clair,
professor of medicine in the Edinburgh University
and one of the pioneers of medical science ; then
John Maclaurin, son of the eminent mathematician,
who was called to the bench as Lord Dreghorn :
then Mr. Alexander Trotter, paymaster of the
navy, whose gi-andson Mr. Coutts Trotter, a man
of literary distinction and patriotic ardour, disposed
of it to Mr. R. A. Macfie, for some years M.P. for
Leith Burghs, under whose hands it has undergone
considerable improvements.

Among the many hobbies of Mr. Macfie, was the
one of erecting monuments of various kinds upon
his estate. At the main entrance to the estate at
Redford he erected a substantial monument in
memory of the Covenanters and others. The
monument stands about thirty feet high, round

96 HISTORY OF COLINTON PARISH.

the top are the words "Romans." "Cromwell,
1650," " Covenanters, 1666," " Charles 1745," with
a tablet fixed upon the base of the pillars, bearing
the inscription beginning " Those teeming plains
were trod by Roman feet," and so on, but are
much too lengthy to afford of their admission here.
The pillars of the above monument formed the
colonnade in front of the old Royal Infirmary,
Edinburgh.

Close at hand is the quaint old house of Redford,
with its garden embosomed among fine trees in a
pretty dell. There are many allusions in the letters
of Cromwell in 1650 to places in its immediate
vicinity. It is particularly interesting as being the
birthplace of " that devourer of books," John Allen,
political and historical writer.

Still further east and at the eastern extremity of
the Parish, on what was at one time the " Temple-
lands of Swanston, was fought a great battle, it is
said, between the ancient Picts and Scots. Two
large cairns were erected there, these, however, were
foolishly broken up by some sacriligious hand and
used for road metal. Tradition records that upon
lifting them a large quantity of human bones were
found in and under them. On the other side of
the turnpike-road stands a very old monolith, the
largest in the vicinity of Edinburgh — this is a large,
rough unhewn pillar of whinstone standing fully
ten feet high. Unfortunately there is neither

The Comas Stone.

98 HISTORY OF COLINTON PARISH.

mark or inscription to give any information as to
its origin. It is known as the Caiy Stone, Comus
Stone, Ket Stone, or Battle Stone. Adjacent to it
is a square of trees marking an extensive camp of
prehistoric times reminding us of

" The mouldering lines,
Where Rome, the Empress of the world,
Of yore her eagle wings unfurled."

The Koman road from York to Carriden passed
through the lands of Comiston here.

The rocky declivity of the Pentlands which
overlooks this, is called Cairketton, 1,580 feet
above sea level. The name was derived probably
from the camp above referred to. The rocks are
chiefly composed of clayey felspar or petunse pent-
landica strongly impregnated with black oxide of
iron and would be very useful but for that
impregnation.

A little to the north stands the mansion-house
of Comiston most probably deriving its name
from the " Comistone " above referred to. It was
built by Sir James Forrest in 1815. The Forrests
of Comiston, however, date further back than this,
mention being made of a Captain Forrest in the
Kirk Session Records in 1719. Sir James Forrest
was Lord Provost of Edinburgh in 1840.

Before the establishment of the Edinburgh and
District Water Trust, and the introduction of the
artificial supply of water from Glencorse and other

BIOGRAPHICAL. 99

reservoirs, the people of Edinburgh chiefly procured
that necessity of life from the springs around this
district which are copious and excellent.

Proceeding further north and still on the eastern
boundary of the parish stands the old fortalice of
Craiglockhart. Strange to say there is not a single
vestige of its precints left. It was built after the
fashion of the old Scottish castle or border keep,
nothing now remaining except the narrow square
tower. As early as Alexander III., 1249, the
estate of Craiglockhart was purchased by Sir
Simon Lockhart, from whom probably the district
has derived its name. The character of the build-
ing— the arched roof, etc.; all point to it having
been built about that date ; and if a little care was
taken to preserve these venerable piles they might
stand for centuries to come.

Two of the largest and most prominent buildings
in the parish are in this vicinity, viz., the Edin-
burgh Hydropathic Establishment and the Edin-
burgh City Poorhouse. The country residences of
the rich and poor respectively.

R E D H A L L.

Within the grounds of Redhall stood the residence
of Sir Simon Otterburn, the friend of George
Buchanan, and who in 1527 was appointed King's
Advocate conjunctly with Sir James Foulis of
Colinton House. He was also Lord Provost of

100 HISTORY OF COLINTON PARISH.

Edinburgh, and represented that City in the
Scottish Parliament when the great dispute took
place on the marriage of Mary Queen of Scots and
Prince Edward of England ; and for some racy
remarks made before that House he was thrown
into prison. Sir Adam, who was twice married,
we are told " presented forty solidi to the altar of
the blessed virgin in St. Giles, Edinburgh, for the
safety of the souls of the two ladies Otterburn."
This family has long been extinct. In 1650, when
inhabited by Major Hamilton, a descendant of Sir
Adam Otterburn, the castle of Redhall was stormed
by Cromwell while skirmishing around Edinburgh
before the " Drove of Dunbar," and after a valiant
resistance was taken and the house sacked, and
the property seized, which must have been con-
siderable, as " sundry gentlemen about had put
their goods there for safety " in these troublous
times. The prisoners, we are told, were stripped
naked and hunted off, but the major was allowed
to make his escape as a reward for his bravery.
The castle must have been completely destroyed
as it was never again inhabited. The ruin has
now completely disappeared, the stones being
utilised in making drains, &c., for the present
mansion-house. All that remains to be seen of the
pile is an escutcheon with the Otterburn's coat-of-
arms upon it (three otters' heads and vyverus),
built into the wall of the old doocote.

BIOGRAPHICAL. 101

The property was bought in 1755 by Mr. George
Inglis, Attorney in Exchequer, and partner of
Henry M'Kenzie, the "Man of Feeling." He at
once began to build the present house, and when
he and his wife died without family in 1785, Red-
hall went to his nephew, Captain John Inglis, RN.,
who commanded " H.M.8. Belliqueux." At the battle
of Camperdown, when so confused by the signals
of the admiral, he shouted with impatience to his
sailing-master, — " Hang it, Jock ! doon wi' the
helm, and gang richt into the middle o't;" closing
his telescope as he spoke. Captain Inglis who was
a close personal friend of Lord Duncan, received
the honorary freedom of the City of Edinburgh
in 1797, and received the rank of Vice-Admiral of
the White in 1805.* He was a Heritor of the
parish, and took great interest in the transactions
of that body.

The mansion-house of Redhall is a nice old
building in the French chateau architecture, the
red harl giving it a picturesque appearance as it
stands in the midst of its wooded environment.
Katesmill, once the foremost in the history of the
papermaking industry, is on the estate. The mills
M^ere situated just below Colin ton Dell, and occu-
pied a site in the romantic valley of the Water of

* He died two years later and was succeeded by his
eldest son, the grandfather of the present proprietor.

102 HISTORY OF COLINTON PARISH.

Leith, upon which mills of one kind or another
have been for hundreds of years. In the earlier
years of the century the mill was devoted to the
manufacture of hand-made paper, and it was there,
it is said, that the paper was made on which the
Bank of Scotland's first notes were printed. That
had to be done under considerable oversight, and
the " bank-house " as it was called, is still standing
while all around is a howling wilderness ; the
shattered walls and gable-ends, and the rusting
machinery, all that now remains of the once busy
hive of industry which was destroyed by fire in
1890. There seems no likelihood of the site being
again utilised for commercial purposes, the pro-
prietor having resolved, largely on the ground of
amenity, to have the tall chimney (275 feet) re-
moved. The chimney was a rather curious object
of interest to travellers by the railway, as the
train running round three sides of it on a sharp
curve, caused it to assume aspects like the Leaning
Tower of Pisa. It was intended to bring down
this enormous structure body-bulk, the modus
operandi being by undermining and pulling. The
steeplejack had on the Thursday made what
were considered ample arrangements for carrying
it to a successful issue, but after it had been
strained for sometime on the Friday afternoon, the
rope broke and matters were allowed to rest. In
the course of the evening further progress was

BIOGRAPHICAL. 103

made with the work of undermining, and every-
thing looked as if the fall would be satisfactorily
brought off on the Saturday afternoon, when it
was expected there would be, as was the case on
the Friday — a large gathering of spectators and
picture-makers by means of the camera. To the
intense disappointment of all these, the chimney
suddenly toppled over at an early hour on the
Saturday morning; and what must have been a
really gi'and spectacle was practically unobserved.

The mill and mansion-house was tenanted for
nearly thirty years by the late David Chalmers,
Esq., a nephew of the Doctor of Disruption fame.

The family and estate of Redhall is now repre-
sented by John Alexander Inglis, Esq., of Redhall
and Auchindinny,

HAILES HOUSE.

To the north-west of Redhall and on the estate
of Sir Thos. D. G. Carmichael, Bart., stands the
Hailes House, supposed, and upon which most of
those interested in the history of the parish are
agreed, that this was the site of the parish church
in Mediaeval times. A little to the south, on the
edge of the bank, stands an old square ivy-mantled
tower, to which every regular passenger in the
Balerno-branch trains has attached some legend;
but the fact is that it was only a well-house used

104 HISTORY OF COLTNTON PARISH.

many years ago for pumping water for the house.
Hailes House was in the beginning of the century
inhabited by a gentleman named Samuel Anderson,
of the Union Bank of Scotland. Mr. Anderson
was born in October 1756, and was married to
Jane Hay of Haystoun. He was a most liberal
benefactor to the poor; on removing from Hailes
House he left a donation of £100 to the Kirk-
session, with instructions to expend the interest
thereof at every returning New Year among the
industrious poor, and many a huml^le fireside has
been cheered and brightened by this mindful
bequest. The deserving poor of the parish still
participate in Mr. Anderson's kindness, though few
know how or where the bequest originated. He
went to reside at Morden, in the parish of Liberton,
where he died in March 1821.

A little to the north of the Hailes House stood
the now forgotten hamlet and mansion-house of
Easter Hailes, which was evidently demolished
when the present house was built.

Easter Hailes must have been a place of great
antiquity. From an old document in the Signet
Library, Edinburgh, we learn that in 1104, Edel-
rad, Earl of Fife, bequeathed the lands of Hailes
to the Church of the Holy Trinity at Dunferm-
line : and the abbot and monks of Dunfermline
retained the superiority of Easter Hailes down to
the Reformation.

BIOGRAPHICAL. 105

Easter Hailes is interesting, having been the
residence of George Drummond, Esq., six times
Provost of Edinburgh.

To this gentleman, the City of Edinburgh in
particular, owes much. He was the projector of
many of those improvements which commenced
under his auspices have advanced with unexampled
rapidity, insomuch that Edinburgh, from a state
approaching to decay and ruin, has risen almost
within the recollection of persons still alive, to be
one of the finest and most interesting cities in the
world.

Mr. Drummond's name is best remembered in
connection with the building of the Royal Infirmary.
The managers after his death in November, 1766,
placed a bust of him by Nollekins in the public
hall of the Hospital, under which the following-
inscription is placed : — " George Drummond, to
whom this country is indebted for all the benefit
which it derives from the Royal Infirmary."

BONALY TOWER.

Bonaly Tower, already mentioned, was early in
the century the residence of Lord Cockburn, a
man who seemed to have been admired everywhere
and by everybody who knew him. To quote his
own words from the " Memorials of his Times,"
which are very striking, and characteristic upon

106 HISTORY OF COLINTON PARISH.

his life here: — "In March 1811 I married, and set
up my rural household gods at Bonaly, in the
parish of Colinton, close to the northern base of
tlie Pentland Hills ; and unless some avenging
angel shall expel me, I shall never leave that
paradise. I began by an annual lease of a few
square yards and a scarcely habitable farm-house :
but, realizing the profanations of Auburn, I have
destroyed a village, and erected a tower, and
reached the dignity of a twenty -acred laird.
Everything, except the two burns and the moun-
tains, is my own work ; and, to a great extent, the
work of my own hands. Human nature is incap-
able of enjoying more happiness than has been
my lot here : where the glories of the prospects,
and the luxury of the wild retirement, have been
all enhanced by the progress of my improvements,
of my children, and of myself. I have been too
happy, and often tremble in the anticipation that
a cloud must come at last. Warburton says, that
there was not a bush in his garden on which he
had not hung a speculation. There is not a recess
in the valleys of the Pentlands, nor an eminence
on their summits, that is not familiar to my soli-
tude. One summer, I read every word of Tacitus,
in the sheltered crevice of a rock (called my seat),
about 800 feet above the level of the sea, with
the most magnificent of scenes stretched out
before me."

BIOGRAPHICAL. 107

This " lion of the parish," as the new " Statistical
Account " calls Bonaly Tower, commands a pass
among the Pentlands, through which we have
every reason to believe, the Covenanters found
their way to Rullion-Green. It was rebuilt by
Lord Cockburn in 1845, but has undergone much
improvement since that date.

Lord Cockburn was the biographer of the well-
known Francis Jeffrey, and in 1856 published his
beautiful " Memorials of his Times," or sketches
of the public character and social habits of the
leading citizens of Edinburgh. He was shrewd,
observant, and playful — a genial humourist, and
a man of fine taste, with a vein of energetic
eloquence when roused, that was irresistable with
a Scottish audience.

Bonaly while occupied by Lord Cockburn, was
a favourite resort of many of the literati of
' Modern Athens ' in his times, and many are the
amusing stories current regarding his Lordship and
his guests. One day, Lord Cockburn went into the
Second Division of the Court of Session, but came
away again very hurriedly, meeting Lord Jeffrey
at the door. " Do you see ony paleness about my
face, Jeffrey ? " asked Cockburn. " No ! " replied
Jeffrey, " I hope you're weel enough ? " "I don't
know," said the other, "but I have just heard
Bolus (Lord Justice-Clerk Boyle), say — ' I for one,
am of opinion that this case is founded on the

108 HISTORY OF COLINTON PARISH.

fundamental basis of a quadrilateral contract ; that
four sides of which are agglutinated by adhesion.' "
"I think, Cockburn," said Jeffrey, "that you had
better go home."

Pleading at the Bar in a steamboat collision
case, the case turned on the fact of one of the
steamers carrying no lights, which was the cause
of the accident, Cockburn insisted on this, and
wound up his eloquent argument with this remark :
— "In fact, gentlemen, had there been more 'lights'
there would have been more ' livers.' "

Dean Ramsay tells the following anecdote about
the shepherd of Bonaly, which I cannot refrain
from subjoining here. — His Lordship was one day
sitting in his favourite nook in the hill behind his
residence, accompanied by the shepherd, and ob-
serving the sheep reposing in the coldest situation,
he remarked to him, — " John, if I were a sheep, I
would lie on the sunny side of the hill ! " " Ah !
my Lord ! " said the shepherd, " but if ye was a
sheep ye would hae mair sense." To this I add
another by Lord Rutherford. He had entered
into conversation with the shepherd, and was com-
plaining bitterly of the weather, which prevented
him enjoying his visit to the country, and said

hastily and unguardedly, " What a d d mist ! "

and then expressed his wonder how or for what
purpose there should have been such a thing
created as east wind. The shepherd, who was a

BIOGRAPHICAL. 109

tall, grim figure, turned sharp round upon him : —
" What ails ye at the mist, sir ? it weets the sod,
it slockens the yowes, and" adding with much
solemnity — " it's God's wull ! " and turned away
with lofty indignation. Lord Cockburn used to
repeat this with much candour, as a fine specimen
of a rebuke from a sincere and simple mind, and
of the readiness in Scotsmen to bear testimony to
their principles.

The following are two hitherto unpublished
letters of Lord Cockburn, showing the interest he
took in the district, and which are characteristic
of the man. The first refers to the voluntary
effort made to raise the church spire ; and the
second, to a subscription for the schoolmaster,
Mr. Hunter: —

BoNALY, 18^?!, October 1837.

My Dear Sir, — It grieves me to think that our
parish spire is likely to remain unraised. It is too
low already ; and the increased size of the church
makes it still more paltry. It is really unworthy of
the most beautiful site in the country.

The heritors can't he expected to do more, as heritors ;
and it is plaguy to get at them in this character. But
very little is required, and you have surely individual
friends of the Church who will voluntarily give the
mites that are wanted. I am told that £30 will raise
it about twenty feet. Now I am confident that, if
applied to, there are many who would at once raise it

110 HISTORY OF COLINTON PARISH.

at the least that height. I need only name Dreghorn,

Comieston, Eedhall, Woodhall, Spylaw, Colinton, &c.

To begin the matter, I set myself down for <£2, 2s., or,

if necessary, for £3, 3s. ; and if only eight or ten others

will do the same, we may in a month see the spire

twenty-five or thirty feet above its present level, and

no longer a reproach to the parish.

It would not be reasonable to expect that you should

take more trouble than you have done already in

getting the church improved. But I send this to you,

because if you think the scheme pernicious or hopeless,

it is perhaps needless to proceed further. But if you

agree with me in thinking it both practicable and

important, then the simplest way will be for you — who

have many slaves — to send a sensible man round with

the enclosed subscription paper; and if you choose to

send this hortatory along with it, as your exposition, it

will save all trouble except that of getting the answers.

I shall take care that the said sensible man is paid for

his errands. But any other way that you think better,

pray adopt. Only don't let us be disgraced. — Yours

faithfully,

H. COCKBURN.

The Revd. Mr. Balfour.

BoNALY, ISth January 1840.

My Dear Sir, — I enclose £5 for our worthy School-
master. I had no idea that it was anything of the
kind that was intended ; supposing that it was a mere
compliment that was meant. Not that I have any

BIOGRAPHICAL. Ill

doubt of its being all quite right ; but I must say that
I question whether anything so magnificent was ever
done by any heritors to any schoolmaster. The truth
is, that I think some of the contributions absurd,— par-
ticularly your own. I do beg of you to take £4 off it.
It's really nonsense ! The Minister of the Parish giving
the same with Sir James Craig, Ijord Glasgow, Mr.
Clapperton, and the Master of Dreghorn ! ! Your sanity
will be justly doubted. And, as I am told, it is by no
means a case of such urgency as justifies these heroic
sacrifices. So take £i off" your benevolent but non-
sensical £5. I meant to have given only £1, but that
our friend might not lose by the deduction of your £4,
I have made it £5. — Yours faithfully,

H. COCKBURK

P.S. — To save you trouble, I have taken it upon me
to score out the figure 5 opposite your name, and to
substitute the figure 1.

The Revd. Mr. Baxfour,
The Maxse, Colinton.

Lord Cockburn wsbs raised to the Bench in 1834,
after acting as Solicitor-General for four years.
He died in 1854 ^at his residence of Bonaly, and
his remains were deposited beside those of many
of his companions in the Dean Cemetery, Edin-
burgh, where an elegant mural monument with

112 HISTORY OF COLINTON PARISH.

bas-relief protile in bronze, has been erected to his
memor}^ It is simply inscribed —

"Henry Cockburn,
Born 26th October, 1779 ; Died 26th April, 1854."

Bonaly Tower was later the residence of Pro-
fessor William B. Hodgson, author of " Education
of Girls and Employment of Women," " Educa-
tional Tour," and some others.

The following poem by Professor Blackie on the
occasion of his visiting Bonaly shortly before the
death of his colleague, may fitly close the notice
of this interesting place : —

THE BURN O' BONALY.

'Twas a cold gleamy day, all hueless and gray,
When the keen March winds whistled over the brae,

That I wandered alone up the valley ;
Behind the old tower, where the wise thinker dwells,
Neath the smooth grassy brae and the clear flowing wells

Of the bonnie green burn o' Bonaly.

I wound me along up the cliff of the brae,
O'er the wreck of the winter, a wild rocky way,

By the bonnie green burn o' Bonaly ;
Long patches of snow, on the brown heather lay,
And a voice on the sugh of the blast seemed to say.

From the bonnie green burn o' Bonaly.

" What seekest thou here in a time without cheer.
When the braes are all bare, and the hills are all drear.

Thou foolish old wandering rhymer ;
When the lone glen-pipes with the shriek of the storm,
And no chant of the light plumy people to charm,

The ear of the mountain climber ?

BIOGRAPHICAL. 113

Go, get thee to town, and stow thee away,
All snugly and close for a month and a day,

Mid the gray books and old inky papers ;
Then come here again when I show my bright face,
In the dress of the April with blossomy grace.

And clear from the chill wintry vapours.

Come when my vegetive wealth I may show,
Of yellow primroses where tufted they grow.

To gather them at will for thy pleasure ;
And when from dull books, thou hast shaken thee free,
A merry May song I will witch out from thee.

To sing to ray sweet-purling measure.

Come when my banks are all gay with the sheen,
Of the light-waving twig tipt with virginal green.

Where the breeze with the blossom may dally ;
Come with the friend of my counsel the best
Or with the dear maid that reclines on thy breast,

By the bonnie green burn o' Bonaly.

Come with the memory pleasant and sweet.

Of the mellow-souled judge, for his leafy retreat,

Who trimmed the old tower of Bonaly ;
Whose heart was as kind as the old grass that grows,
Whose voice was as sweet as the water that flows,

Round the green ivy-tower o' Bonaly.

Come with bright thoughts like my fountain that wells,
Round the gray-castled hall where the wise thinker^'dwells.

By the quiet green slope of the valley ;
And bathe thee in seas of the flowery perfume.
That floats from the breath of the furze and the broom.

By the bonnie green burn o' Bonaly."
II

114 HISTORY OF COLINTON PARISH.

WOODVILLE.

At Woodville resided the Rev. Archibald Alison,
(1757-1839), a man of amiable character and varied
accomplishments. In 1790 he published " Essays
on the Nature and Principles of Taste," in 1818
" A Memoir of Lord Woodhouselee," also two
volumes of Sermons remarkable for eloquence of
composition. He was prebendary of Salisbury and
senior minister of St. Paul's Chapel, Edinburgh.

Sir Archibald Alison, K.C.B., a nephew of the
above, also a former resident at Woodville, was
born in Edinburgh in 1826. Educated in Glasgow
and Edinburgh Universities. Entered the army
in 1846. He served in the Crimean War, the
Indian Mutiny, losing his right arm at the relief
of Lucknow; the Ashanti Expedition, and the
Egyptian Campaign, leading the Highland Brigade
at the battle of Tel-el-Kebir. This fine old soldier
was gazetted Lieutenant General in 1882, and the
following year was appointed at the Command at
Aldershot.

Amongst other distinguished names connected
with the parish may be mentioned those of Lord
President Lockhart, a man whose talents and
courage would have adorned a better period, fell
a victim to the fury of one of those savages
which misgovernment produces. He was murdered

BIOGRAPHICAL.

115

by John Chiestey of Redhall, in March 1689;
Lord President Gilmour, Principal Hutton, Pro-
fessor Robertson Smith, Dr. Murray, (author of
" Literary History of Galloway," " Life of Samuel
Rutherford," " Annals of Colinton Parish," &c.,
&c). Erskine Nicol, James L. Wingate, and
Robert Alexander, Artists.

Ql\f)apiev V.

SCHOOLS AND SCHOOLMASTERS.

" Beside yon straggling fence that skirts the way,
With blossom'd furze unprofitably gay ;
There, in his noisy mansion skill'd to rule,
The village master taught his little school."

Ooldsmith.

^T is not my intention here to enter into
any controversy relating to systems of
Education, ancient or modern, which
will be better left to those competent
to deal with them, but rather to give, though it
must necessary be a faint idea, of the Parish
School from an early date, giving from the
Kirk Session "Records, anything relating to the
appointment of teachers, the building of the new
schools, &c., and bringing it up to the present time.
Therefore without making any further preliminary
remarks, I will proceed with the Extracts : —

"Sept. 23, 1655.

The sessione being conveened and none absent :
the minister having called upon the name of God,

SCHOOLS AND SCHOOLMASTERS. 117

there was a complaint givne in against John Craw
the scoolmr, and Marg*- Crawford his wife, that in
the seoolhouse so near to ye Kirk and hard by the
minister's yate, there should be aile brewed and
sold and intemperate drinking in that place that
was builded for a better use and by them that
shuld give good example to others. Heirupon it
was ordered by unanimous consent of the heritors
and elders present for preventing of disturbance to
ye naybours and that the scoollers should not be
left to that disorder, as there Mr. to be w*Mrawne
by such occasions from attendance and that people
shuld not be suffered to come and sitt tipling
and drinking unseasonable many tymes w**^ pro-
fane discourse and cursing and swearing (don't
be scandalised, gentle reader, it is more than 200
years since). That out of those, and other con-
siderations the scoolmr. and his wife shuld be
discharged and inhibited either to brew or sell
anie drink for tyme to corpe, and that if they did
pretend they could not otherwise have sufficient
maintenance that then the said John Craw shuld
take himself to some other calling and leeve the
scool w*^ some other man, more able for that
charge whoe shuld make that his business and
calling to wait upon ye scool. This being enacted
John Craw was called upon and by the minister
in name of the sessione was made acquainted w***
this order."

118 HISTORY OF COLINTON PARISH.

"November 18, 1655.
The sessione being mett after prayer John Craw
desired he might be admitted, he not having to
Wedensday before appeared before the presbiterie
in ye matter of his apeale said he was now come
to recall his appeale and that he was willing of
himself freely to give over the charge he had in
the Kirke and scool, and desired them to provide
some more able and sufficient man, whereupon the
minister was intreated by ye sessione to find out
some able and good man to take charge of the
scool and to be precentor."

"December 2, 1655.

The elders being conveened, God's name being
called upon, none being absent except Collingtoun
who was excused ; the minister acquainted them
upon ther desire to him concerning a scoolmaster
he had recommended the providing of a sufficient
man to a Reverend friend who had sent him out
to them that day, one Mr. Andrew Pitcarne of
the bounds of the prisbiterie of Kirkadie, whoe
being called in by the sessione, upon that assurance
was given them bothe for his life and learning, he
was unanimously elected by them all to ye place
aforesaid."

No mention is made of Mr. Pitcarne's resignation
or of a new appointment which must have taken
place, as the following denotes : —

SCHOOLS AND SCHOOLMASTERS. 119

"Jan. 22, 1661.

Mr. James Anderson, Sessione Mett, ye present

called to a Kirke. scoolmr did make it known to

ye sessione yt he had a mynd
to remove from his charge at
Candlemas, qrupon ye sessione
comitted it to ye minister to
try out a qualified man for ye
place."

The schoolmasters in these days had also to
qualify themselves for the post of precentor and
reader. In fact, it would appear from the following
that the precentorship was the more important of
the oflSces.

"Feb. 3, 1661.

Sessione Mett : This day Mr. Will Carmichael,
gave a try all of his singing before the congregation,
ye sessione intorrogate one by one how they were
satisfied : all of yera professed they wer well
pleased, qrupon they resolved to tak a tryall of
him for their scoolmr till Lambas and appointed
him to tak up ye scool on Tuesday come eight days
being the 12 day of this instant."

The salary allowed the reader was £10 Scots,
(16/8) yearly, which added to his salary as school-
master and precentor came to about £5 yearly. On
the establishment of parish schools the minimum
salary was raised to 100 Merks (£5, 12/6).

120

HISTORy OF COLINTON PARISH.

Although there is certainly a great depreciation in
the value of money, we cannot but imagine that
there has been an enormous advance in social
comforts.*

"May 10, 1663.

This day also ye scoolmr in-
formed the sessione that he had
a mynd to leave ye scool and
desyred yen to provyde another
for ye place. This day ye
sessione desyred ye minister to
search out for a scoolmaster."

Mr. Will Carmichell,
acquaints ye sessione
of his purpose to leave
us by a call to ane
Kirke.

Mr. Eobert Purdie,
did enter scool-
master.

"May 29, 1663.
This day the sessione ordained
that the children should not learn
in ye Kirke thereafter, as they
had formerly done in regard ye
fabrik of ye Kirke, &c. Gentle-
men's desks was abused by them, butt appoynts the
scoolmr to take up ye scool in ye scoolhouse and
appoynts to see yt it be in good order and watertight
for that effect, also the scoolmr is appoynted to tak up
ye scool Tuesday following."

The following is taken from the " Edinburgh Advertiser "
for 1788, nearly a 100 years after the date of which I write,
which shows the depreciation in the value of money. A horse
could be purchased for 10/-, a cow for 9/-, a sheep for 1/-, a
bole of wheat for 1/-, a bole of rye, beans or peas 8d., oats
3d., tea however could hardly be got for money, whisky
being about 2/6 a gallon.

SCHOOLS AND SCHOOLMASTERS. 121

"Jan. 22, 1665.

Sessione Mett : This day Mr. Eobert Purdie,
scoolmr did acquaint ye sessione of a call he had
gotten to a Kirke in Gallawa and desyred yen to
seeke for some other scoolmr, ye sessione desyred
ye minister to acquaint ye heritors qo were absent
of it and also desyred him to seeke out a young-
man."

The sessions seem to have been put to so much
inconvenience by their schoolmasters being called
to churches that when advertising for them in the
" Edinbui-gh Advertiser," they frequently had the
" N.B. — Such as have a view to the ministry need
not apply."

"Febr. 26, 1665.

Sessione Mett : This day Wm. Johnston in
Swanston told ye sessione yt he knew of one
William Wood whoe would be fit to be scoolmr.
The sessione desyred him to send to the said Wm.
to come and give a tryall of his singing and to
bring a testimorial from ye minister of ye Bothans
concerning his abilities to be scoolmr qr he resided."

"March 21, 1665.

Sessione Mett : This day ye said Wm. Wood cam
to ye sessione after he had yt day given a tryall of
his singing w**^ qch ye sessione wer satisfied and
also ye heritors yt were present, ye minister told

122 HISTORY OF COLINTON PARISH.

ye sessions yt he had spoken w**^ the heritors and
yt they referd it to ye sessione to do in it as they
thought fite. The sessione thinks it hte to tak a
tryall of the said Wm. Wood for halfe a yeare
having a good testimony from Mr. La wrens Charters
ye minister at ye Bothans and appoynts him to tak
up ye scool a fyfteen days after yt being ye 4 of
Apryle."

I give some of these extracts, not because the
things said are so much out of the common as
that the language in which they are expressed is
picturesque, odd and taking.

"Janr. 19, 1668.

The sessione mett all present, Wm. Wood, present
scoolmr, did lay downe his charge for he found yt
he culd not stay and discharge his office to ye
satisfactione of ye paroch. The sessione desyred
ye minister to see for another scoolmaster."

"Feb. 4, 1668.

The sessione mett, ye minister told yem yt my
Lord Colintoune had been speaking to him for
Thomas Johnston to be scoolmr whoe for ye present
was in his familie attending his sons and also born
in ye paroch. The sessione were well pleased w*^
ye mentione and desyred yt he might give a tryall
of his singing ye next Lord's day."

SCHOOLS AND SCHOOLMASTERS. 123

"Feb. 7, 1668.

The sessione being mett and Thomas Johnston
having given a proof of his singing in ye Church
publicklie the sessione was weel satisfied and re-
ceived him to yair scoohnaster."

The following is the Act, establishing parish
schools taken from an old statute-book of this
date : —

" XXVI.

Act FOR Settling of Schools.

October 9, 1696.

Our soveraign Lord, considering how prejudicial
the want of schools in many places have been, and
how beneficial the establishing and sittling thereof
in every paroch will be to this Church and King-
dom : Therefore, His Majesty with advice and
consent of the estates of Parliament, STATUTS
AND ORDAINS, that there be a school settled
and established, and a schoolmaster appointed in
every paroch, not already provided by advice of the
heritors and minister of the paroch, and for that
efiect, that the heritors in every paroch meet and
provide a commodious house for a school, and settle
and modifie a salary to a schoolmaster, which shall
be not under one hundred merks, (£5, 12/6 stg.),
nor above two hundred merks to be paid yearly at
two terms ; Whitsunday and Martinmas by equal

124 HISTORY OF COLINTON PARISH.

portions, and that they stent and lay on the said

salary conform to every heritors valued rent within

the paroeh, allowing each heritor relief from his

tenants of the half of his proportion, for settling

and maintaining of a school and payment of the

schoolmaster's sallary ; which sallarie is declared

to be by and attour the casualities, which formerly

belonged to the readers and clerks of the Kirk

Session."

"Haills Kirke alias Collingtoun,

March 1, 1700.
Inter alia,

Which acts anent schoolmasters, governours,
and pedagogues aforesaid, the session resolves to
obey so far as conserns them and recommends to
the treasurer to buy a coppie of the printed acts."

"Febr. 2, 1703.

This day the session taking the session clerk's
circumstances to their consideration and finding
that his school is much worse than it used to be
and his casualities but few, they did and hereby do
adde to his former sallarie ten pounds Scots, extend-
ing in haill to twenty pounds Scots, (£1, 13/4),
beginning his first payment at Lambas by past.
Declaring neverless that this their agmentation is
only during pleasure and that as a personal favour
to him, not to be extended to his successors unless
the session shall think fite."

SCHOOLS AND SCHOOLMASTERS. 125

And whereas the said session clerk is put to
more trouble than usuall in mentioning the desig-
nations of the persons whose bans matrimonial he
has occasion to intimate in our church and that his
allouance therefore is but small, being one shilling
Stirling they did and hereby doe adde four shillings
Scots, extending in all to sixteen shillings Scots,
which they allow him to exact and uplift from any
whose bans matrimonial he shall have occasion to
intimate hereafter in our church declaring always
that the said addition of four shillings Scots may
anytime hereafter be recalled, if the sessione shall
think it convenient so to do."

" At Hailes Kirke alias Collington the seven-
teenth day of November 1720 : —

" I, Mr. Thomas Johnston, Precentor, School-
master, and Clerk to the Kirk-session of Hails,
alias Collintone, considering that I cannot oflSciat
as becomes one in those offices aforesaid, be reason
of age and indisposition, therefore I demit.

Sic suhscrihitur. Tho. Johnston."

Which demission the Meeting accepted of and
ordered to be kept in retentis.

Therefore the Meeting took into their considera-
tion what was fit to be done for the said Mr.
Johnston ; and in the first place, unanimously
agreed that the quarter salary due at Candlemas

126 HISTORY OF COLINTON PARISH.

next, should be allowed him, and they next con-
descended to an yearly gratuity for his subsistence
during his life, to be paid at two terms in the year,
viz. : Candlemas and Lambass. . . . Therefore,
the Meeting considering that the offices of School-
master, Precentor, and Session-clerk are now vacant,
and there being severale candidates proposed : the
session being stated and the votes marked, Mr,
John Gow was by plurality of votes, elected to the
said three offices."

"Janr. 23, 1722.

This day, Mr. John Gow, our present School-
master and Session-clerk, gave in a demission of
all his offices. . . . The Session having considered
that they will want a Precentor to serve in the
interim, did unanimously agree that Mr. James
Johnstone, papermaker, Collintone papermiln, do
serve during the vacancy." Here the offices above
referred to, begin to be divided.

"March 22, 1722.

Inte7' alia — There having been a list of severalls
for Schoolmaster and Session-clerk : after some
reasoning this Meeting unanimously made choice
of Mr. William Pollock, present Schoolmaster at
Ratho, to be their Schoolmaster and Session-clerk ;
and appoints Alex. Burton in Craiglockhart, Mungo

SCHOOLS AND SCHOOLMASTERS. 127

Burton* in Easter Hailles, David Denholm and
William Denholm, to intimate this to him upon
Munday next, and to desire him to come to this
place at his first conveniency."

* Mr. Edward Burton, who died at his residence in
Colinton some months ago, was the last of a long line of
that name, and who have had connection with the parish
for centuries. When the records begin in 1651, there
was a James Bruntoune, an Elder, and they follow one
another in that esteemed office until the discord in 1783,
when they joined the Seceders.

Many of the members of their families have made honour-
able names in their professions, — teaching, painting, and
line-engraving, as well as in humbler occupations.

Among other old family names in the parish are the
Denholms, a still older family than the Burtons, and some-
times no fewer than three in the eldership at one time.
An old monument is said to have borne the following
absurd couplet, but which I have failed to find : —

" Here lyes the banes o' Cuthbert Denhom,
If ye saw him noo ye wouldna ken him."

Porteous — a name for centuries connected with the
parish, now represented by George M. Porteous, Esq., of
Juniper Green ; Scotts of Colinton Mains and Oxgangs ;
Davies (of Torphin). In front of Davie's monument in the
churchyard lies a ' through ' stone, which is claimed by
that family. The inscription is wholly obliterated. In
the Session Records there is the following entry, which
probably refers to this stone : —

Item — March 31, 1696. — James Davie gave in to ye
poor for ye previlidge of setting a ' through ' stone
on his wife's grave. -04-00-00.

128 HISTORY OF COLINTON PARISH,

" Hales Kirk, alias Collin ton, October 26, 1739.

Sederunt of Heritors and Elders of the Parish
of CoUington, present : — James Foullis, Esq., of
CoUintone, for self and heir of Woodhall,
Mr. John Drummond of Hailles, and for
James Hamilton and Mr. John Packhile of
Craig] ockhart. Mr. Robert Dalrymple of
Dreghorn Thomas Cleghorn of Firhill,
James Muirhead of Spylaw. The Reverend
George Gibson, Minister. The above Mr.
Dalrymple, John Laidly, and James Baad —
Elders.

N.B. — The reason I mention these names is that you
may see the different names connected with the parish at
this time.

Inter alia — Mr. Brown, present Schoolmaster,
having informed the meeting of his design of leav-
ing this place, gave in his demission which was
accepted of, he having got a call to another place.

N.B. — No mention is made of Mr. Brown's appointment.

The Meeting being informed of the qualifications
and fitness of Mr. Alex. Ferguson, presently at
Ratho, for officiating as Schoolmaster and Session-
clerk, &c., did unanimously elect him and allow
him the salary and perquisites accrueing from sd.
oflSces, from Lambass Jaivise (seventeen hundred)
and thirty-nine : which was intimated to sd. Mr.
Ferguson,"

SCHOOLS AND SCHOOLMASTERS. 129

" Hailes Kirk, Dec. 14, 1749.

Inter alia — Mr, Ferguson, late Schoolmaster
here having demitted, the Mod. mformed the
Session that Robt Lithgow, late schoolmaster in
Ladybank had been recommended, and that the
Heritors by missives had unanimously consented
to have sd vacancy filled up by him. Thereupon
they chose him their clerk, took his promise de
fedeli, and ordered it to be recorded as an act
of the Session."

Mr. Lithgow resigned in 1750, and was succeeded
by Mr. Alexander Stewart, student of divinity,
who held the oflSces till about 1761.

"May 14, 1761.
Sederunt.— The Rev. Mr. Robt. Fisher, Robert
Denholm, Robert Warden and James Red-
path — Elders. The Session taking into
consideration that they had wanted a
Session-clerk for some time, did unanimously
make choice of William Weir, Schoolmaster,
Colinton, to be their Clerk."

N.B. — No mention is made of Mr. Stewart's resignation,
or of Mr. Weir's appointment as Schoolmaster.

The Schoolmasters' Act was an important legis-
lative measure which passed in 1803. This is the
statute which compelled the Heritors of parishes
to build what was called ' Houses ' for the school-
masters : but prescribes that the house need not
contain more than two rooms, including the
I

130 HISTORY OF COLINTON PARISH.

'kitchen.' This shabbiness was often abused at
the time, and seems incredible now. In many
cases there was considerable difficulty in getting
even two rooms ; the great majority of lairds and
Scotch Members of Parliament were indignant at
being obliged to "erect palaces for dominies."

About this time, Mr. Stewart the schoolmaster,
after much delay and trouble, induced the Heritors
to repair his house, which evidently had been out
of repair. The following is the account of the
work : —

To eighteen Thraves of Thatch for School-
house, at 3 sh. sterl. per thrave . £2 14 0

To thirteen Thraves do., for the School-
master's House, at 3 sh. sterl. per
thrave . . . 1 19 0

To a Workman 24 days for finishing the

same, at a mark Scots per day . 16 8

To a Cart for carrying clay and Divot for

rigging . . .026

Summa £6 2 2

The old thatched Schoolhouse which must have
stood near to the Parish Church, as we are told it
was "hard by the minister's yate," was in 1811
found too ruinous for repairing, and in the follow-
ing Minute the Heritors make arrangements for
the building of a new Parish School. The same
building that is now occupied by the Parish
Council as their office.

SCHOOLS AND SCHOOLMASTERS. 131

" Colintoun Kirk, June 8, 1811.
Present. — Sir William Forbes, Bart. Pres. —
James Forest, Esq., Comiston ; John Inglis,
Esq., Redhall ; John Foulis, Esq., Woodhall ;
Rev. John Fleming.
The Meetiuo; having been called to consider the
circumstances of the present school and school-
master's house, and having heard a Report from
John Eraser, builder, Colinton, respecting the
present state of the building: agree in opinion
that it is better in the whole circumstances of the
case, to erect an entire new building, than attempt
to repair the present one. They also agree that
the situation should be changed, and that a quarter
of an acre can be got from Gillespie's Hospital, on
the bank south of the new street in the village.
The Meeting further agree in thinking that the
new building should be constructed as to accommo-
date one hundred and twenty scholars in the
public school, and to enable the schoolmaster to
keep ten or twelve boarders."

While we are thus speaking of the Parish School,
it must be remembered that there were other little
schools throughout the parish : the kirk-session,
however, having the power to grant or withhold
the liberty of teaching privately.

"Appryl 20, 1667.
The session being mett, Margaret Pringle did

132 HISTORY OF COLINTON PARISH.

desyre libertie from ye session to teach young ones.
The session in regard yt Swanstone where she
desyred this libertie was far from ye scool, gave
her libertie during yer pleasure to learn young
ones."

Again : —

" This day the minister did acquaint ye session
yt a woman a stranger had come to Comistoun and
taken up a scool att her own hand: the session
ordained William Johnston, Elder, to show her that
the session would not suffer her to teach a scool
w^^n ye paroch until she did satisfie ye publik
scool mr, yem they only allow to teach a scool.
It being butt a litl paroch it is needles to have
more scools butt one."

It is not many years ago since the old thatch
cottage was taken down, which stood on the
sloping ground to the west of the churchyard, and
whiiih was a school taught by a Mr. Elliot — better
known as Willie Elliot. From the old residenters
of the district, Willie seems to have been a great
worthy, as would seem from the following : —
Willie had occasion to fill up a schedule of some
kind which required the extent of playground
attached to his school, and as an advertisement
most likely, he wrote : " Two parks and a spacious
dell." A monument is " Erected by a few friends
of the late William Elliot, Teacher, Colinton, as a

SCHOOLS AND SCHOOLMASTERS. 133

memorial of their respect and esteem of his upright
character and persevering industry under most
trying circumstances (Willie had only one arm).
Died Feby, 1865, aged 76 years."

oiT] wep (f>vW(i)y yeiieri
Tolrjde r]l avapijjv."

Upon the establishment of the School Boards, all
those small schools were taken over by them.

The tirst schoolmaster of the new school was a
Mr. John Wallace, who was appointed in 1811 as
assistant and successor to Mr. Weir, and taught
till 1815, when another appointment is made.

"CoUington, Janr. 28, 1815.
The Meeting having examined the different
certificates of the candidates for supplying the
vacancy in the parochial school, were unanimously
of opinion that Mr. Robert Hunter, A.M., at present
tutor in the family of the Right Hon. James, Earl
of Caithness, has brought forward recommenda-
tions both as to his literary qualifications and
moral character that are quite exceptional ; and
therefore they have nominated and appoint him,
and hereby do nominate and appoint the said
Mr. Robert Hunter to be schoolmaster.

N.B. — The Branches of Education to be taught in the
school are English, Writing, Arithmetic, Mensuration,
Book-keeping, Latin, and the first principles of Greek."

From the foregoing note it would appear that

134 HISTORY OF COLINTON PARISH.

there has not been so much advancement in Board
School education as the educationalist would have
us to believe, and it is not beyond question
whether the results of those old styles of education
— now looked upon as antiquated — are to be com-
pared favourably with the present ' cram ' system.

In 1840 Mr. Hunter became partially incapaci-
tated from teaching and an assistant was appointed.
This appointment had the effect of curtailing Mr.
Hunter's income considerably and a movement was
set on foot by his friends to render him comfortable
in his old age.

Mr. Hunter continued to supervise educational
matters in the parish and hold various offices till
his death in February 1845.

He was buried in Colinton churchyard, but
neither storied urn or animated bust or any other
memorial, marks his last resting-place.

We now come to the last of the parochial school-
masters, the dominies of the old school, in the

* I might here mention a person wh o must be well remem-
bered by all older inhabitants of the district, namely, that
of the old postmaster John Macfarlane, who for 50 years
was precentor in the parish church. Among my earliest
recollections of the church is that of old John standing
solemn and reverend on communion Sundays in the corner
of the manse pew, singing and reciting two lines about of
the ciii. Psalm, " O thou my soul bless God the Lord," &c.,
while the people went in and out of the few tables in front
set apart for sacrament.

SCHOOLS AND SCHOOLMASTERS. 135

person of a highly respected and esteemed gentle-
man, the late Mr. James Russell of Colinton Bank.
Mr. Russell was the son of Alexander Russell, a
cotton spinner at Blackburn and Janet Glasgow
his wife. Brought up in the most humble circum-
stances, he attended the Bathgate Academy and
afterwards attended the University of Edinburgh
for two sessions, thereby qualifying himself for the
teaching profession. His first school was Bells-
quarry, a small school in the parish of Mid-Calder,
where he officiated but a short time. He was
acting as an assistant in Montrose Academy, when
the heritors at their meeting of 20th February
1845, resolved to make inquiries after Mr. James
Russell now at Montrose, and Lord Dunfermline
undertook to make the inquiry and report. The
report was satisfactory. Mr. Russell was invited to
attend the next meeting of heritors. At that meet-
ing the heritors as they express themselves in their
minute, " did and hereby do cordially nominate and
appoint the said Mr. James Russell, teacher, to be
the parochial schoolmaster at Colinton." which
office he held till 1872, the passing of the Educa-
tion (Scotland) Act, when he was appointed School
Board Clerk, which office together with the offices
of Inspector of Poor and Registrar he held till
1891, when he retired from all public service.

Mr. Russell died in his retirement in November
1894, at the ripe age of 79, having been an elder

136

HISTORY OF COLINTON PARISH.

in the parish church for the long period of 50
years.

In the beginning of this century the " Education
of the Masses " was a " much vexed question " as to
whether education should be enforced and guided
by the state, or whether it should be left to volun-
tary efforts. Whether desirable or undesirable, one
fact is certain and no less important than certain,
that since the passing of the Education (Scotland)
Act of 1872, and the proper establishment of a
national system of education, a great advancement
has been made in the education of the people gener-
ally. The result of the passing of this vital and
needful measure in this parish is, that instead of
a small dingy looking parochial school we have
now six well-equipped public schools taught by a
staff of seventeen certificated teachers.

" Many shall run to and fro and knowledge tihall be
increased."

Reminiscence of
" When strict Father Weir with his Tawse did bear ride."

QLljaptev VI.

JOTTINGS FROM THE RECORDS.

' ' My tongue pads slowly under this strange language,
And starts and stumbles at these uncouth phrases ;
They may be great in worth and weight, but hang
Upon the native glibness of my language.
Like Saul's plate-armour on the shepherd boy,
Encumbering and not arming him."

J. B.

)E now come to the last, and
which may prove to many, the
most interesting and valuable
chapter, namely — the Extracts
from the Kirk-Session Records.

Though I have made them as full as possible,
I could not as a matter of propriety enter into
anything like detail, as I had intended doing.

The Records, which date back to 1651, have
been beautifully written and are in good preserva-
tion, yet they are extremely difficult for the
average person to read — not only from the curious
formed characters but from the quaint way the
clerks had of expressing themselves, and their

138 HISTORY OF COLINTON PARISH.

favourite hobby of dabbling in Latin. The follow-
ing short passage might keep one in amusement
for some time : — " James Thorn being cited pro
secundo and called, but not compearing, ordered
that he be cited pro tertio."

The Session at time of which these Minutes
were written, formed, one may say, the only
recognised local judicatory — whose autocratic
power no one dare challenge. Its members, com-
posed of "honest men," were most strict and
assiduous in the duties of their office. In the
mitigation of poverty — a state almost universal —
they were most unwearied. It was quite a common
thing for the elder who went round with the ladle
to remind such members of the cono-regation as
seemed backward in their charity, by giving them
a ' poke ' with the ' brod ' and making in an audible
whisper such remarks as, — " Wife at the braid
raailin, mind the puir ! " " Lass wi' the braw plaid,
mind the puir ! " etc. Also in the promotion of
virtue and in the check of immorality ; in this
latter however, their discipline was altogether
tyrannical. It seemed to have been founded upon
ignorance of human nature, consequently their
well-meant though misapplied efforts would often
be a source of evil instead of good ; so much so,
that even in this quiet rural parish scarcely a
Sabbath passed which did not witness some
offender, without respect to sex or rank, stand

JOTTINGS FROM THE RECORDS.

139

in sackcloth at the church-door, or in the ' jouges,' *
or at the pillar, or which was more frequent, seated
upon the ' cutty ' or stool of repentance, according
to the nature of the offence. Had the delinquent
only been exposed for a Sabbath or two, the result

The Cutty Stool.

might have been otherwise, but there are instances
where individuals stood thus exposed for thirty-

'"' "August 7, 166i».
* Compeared Janet Lader and was found guiltu of reproach-
ing her naybour, for gch she was appointed to make satis-
faction before ye congregation, gch she would not doe after
she was cald on many Sabbaths from ye pulpit, for gch she
stoode in ye jouges from ye second bell all ye tyme of ye
forenoon sermon."

140 HISTORY OF COLINTON PARISH.

one successive Sundays (Aug. 1681). You can
imagine how their sense of shame would be totally-
destroyed and all delicacy of feeling effaced, not
only on the part of the culprit but on the people
generally. Nor was there any use of trying to
escape this rigid discipline by clearing out, for
one parish was just as bad as another, and there
was no chance of getting employment elsewhere
without that all-important ' Testificate ' * from the
minister, and we find many instances where the
fugitive was marched back from long distances in
order to " satisfy ye sessione."

Times, however, have happily changed ; sounder
and more enlightened views are now entertained,
both as to the promotion of virtue and the punish-
ment of immorality, and these Ecclesiastical Courts
are now of a most useful and liberal character,
enjoying both the respect and confidence of their
congregations.

I should, however, but very imperfectly execute
the task I had undertaken were I not to make the
extracts as full as possible. I am glad, therefore,
to be able to give a few of a varied description
which may prove interesting.

* ' ' The Session considering the terme of Whitsunday
now approacheth, agree that intimation be made from the
pulpit the next Lord's day to all Masters of families within
the parocli that they take care not to receive home servants
unless they be instructed with sufficient Testificates."

jottings from the records. 141

Our Quota at Dunbar.

1650. — In this year was fought the famous
* Drove ' of Dunbar, where Cromwell routed the
Scottish army under Leslie. The defeat was not
to be wondered at when we find what the Scotch
army was composed of. It appears that after the
landing of Charles II. at the mouth of the Spey, a
kind of press-gang took place, carrying away from
every village all who were able to carry a scythe
or fork. Of this motley throng, Colinton appears
to have given its quota as may be observed from
the following: —

"Feb. 24, 1656.

Sessione mett, all present, Marion Park came in
humbly desiring a certificate for marriage w**^ one
Archibald Weylands in ye West Kirk parish (as
she said she was a widow), her husband having
been slain at Dunbar."

"Mar. 2, 1656.

Again Marion Park came in about her marriage
(w*^^ matter had been represented to ye presbi-
terie by our minster, and they had put it
back again to ye Session), to try what clearness
they could gett by examining of some witnesses,
to witt Andrew Marshall and Adam Rae, whoe
upon the desyre of some of the Elders did come
and appear before our Sessione this day and being

142 HISTORY OF COLINTON PARISH.

asked apart what they knew concerning Archibald
Campbell, husband of ye said Marion Park, and
when he was last in yr company, they both did
agree in this ansser that on Tuesday, 3 Sept. 1650,
early in the morning in the lewguer before Dunbar,
Archibald had been in yr company, but when the
onsett was made by the English horse upon the
Scots armie, that company wherein they and ye
said Archibald were, was quite broken and routed,
and after that they could never hear anie more of
him, and that when the said Andrew and Adam
w**^ severall others were taken prisoners and kept
there in some yards, they made all the enquirie
they could amoungst the prisoners for ye said
Archibald, but could not learn anie thing of him,
so that they were of opinion that he was slain."

There seems to have been much of the ' Holy
Secret Council ' about the Session. We should
have liked to have known how this affair ended,
but whether it resulted in marriage bells and
orange blossom the record is silent.

The general state of Scotland at this time must
have been most melancholy, reduced as the
country was to temporary submission under Oliver
Cromwell, whose power here as elsewhere, was
founded upon military usurpation only. He had
built strong citadels at Leith, Ayr, Inverness,
and Glasgow ; eighteen garrisons were maintained
through the kingdom, and a standing army of

JOTTINGS FROM THE RECORDS. 143

ten thousand men were lodged upon the people
of every village and hamlet throughout the
country, as you may observe from the following
extract from the Records, dated, —

"Julie 15, 1655.

The Elders mett all in Sessione. John Robinson
of Bonaley having been two dayes before delated
to the minister for some disorderly cariage on the
last Sabath and thereupon the minister had him
cited to come before ye Sessione. He appeared
and being asked what his disorder had been the
Sabath before : he told us that some English being-
quartered w*'* them, had desired him to drink in
yer company at the ailehouse, but professed he
stayed but a short tyme w**^ them, but presently
when he perceived the company to grow disorderly
he left them. He was there rebuked by the
minister for going to an ailehouse w*^ anie com-
pany on the Lord's day, and admonished to keep
that day religiously thereafter, w''*^ he promised
to doe."

The only purpose for which soldiers were
stationed in such places, was to act as spies and to
intercept fugitives flying from place to place, and
these being stationed at Bonaly would seem to
indicate that there was a road to the south here,
which may safely be assumed was the present
right-of-way.

144 HISTORY OF COLINTON PARISH,

The country undoubtedly was kept in utter
subjection by such a course as this, but it was
bound to have had a most demoralising effect,
though it is only the more flagrant cases that come
under our notice in history.

Inventory of Church Goods.

We now pass from the days of Cromwell to a
period of no less distressing times, when Claver-
house was in the height of his fame, in his bloody
and merciless adventures of 1689. It would seem
from the following that it was immaterial whether
one was friendly or not; if there was money or
property to be plundered, the troopers were always
about to relieve you of it. Even Colinton Church
whose minister had favoured Episcopacy, had to
have their belongings hid.

"Apryl 27, 1689.

The Kirk goods were taken away and delivered
to Adam Thomson, tenant in Bonallie, viz. — Two
velvet Mort-cloaths — viz., a larger and a lesser:
ye larger was a hundred Merks. The paroch have
ye use of ye larger for three shillings sterling, and
ye lesser for eighteen shillings Scots (1/6).* There

* A mortcloth was a large black velvet cover draped with
a deep border of tassels, used for hanging over the coffin
while being carried to the cliurchyard, and for the use of
which as we are told above, the Session charged a fee. A
mortcloth is still preserved in the Session-house of the
Parish Church here.

JOTTINGS FROM THE RECORDS. 145

belongs also to our Kirk Sessione two large silver
cups, bought 1680 w*^ consent of ye Sessione att
ye pryce of three hundred Merks and threttie one
pounds Scots money, the weight of ye one is
threttie two ounces and two drops, and ye other
thrette two ounces and one drop. Ye one cup
hath on it, — '* The Cup of Blessing gch we Blesse,
Is it not ye communion of ye blood of Christ : I am
ye vine ye are ye hrenches." And also, — " This
Cup belongs to ye Kirk Sessione of Collingtoune.'*
And upon the other, — " This Cup is ye New
Testament in my blood gch is shed for you, I an ye
vine ye are ye brenches. This Cup belongs to ye
Kirk Sessione of Collingtoun." As also there
belongs to the Sessione ye communione broad cloth
■vyth two servets, a Bassine for ye Baptism w*
linens. Also there belongs ane hand bell and ane
large Kirk Bible. The present Elders in ye paroch
are six in number, vizt. : — Laurance Canyngham,
John Pursell, John Forest, James Brunttoune
(Burton), Thomas Thomson, and James Watsone.
The Clerk to ye Sessione hath ten pounds Scots
allowed him in ye year for his fie, and three
pounds Scots att ye communione. The Kirk
Officer hath fourteene pounds Scots and a merk
for his fie and a crown att ye communione."

A Vicar of Bray.
The church, as we can well imagine, seems to

146 HISTORY OF COLINTON PARISH.

have been in a state of mutilation " the black hand
of defection being extended to the red hand of
persecution." The ministers, except in the West
where many endured want and misery and the
extremities of the sword and gallows rather than
renounce one iota of the doctrine held by the
Presbyterian kirk, the ministers I said proved
themselves a sect of lukewarm indifferent shep-
herds, who either deserted their flocks to save
themselves from the rage of persecution, or, which
was no better, turned over to Episcopacy and
trackled with the enemy. In the case of Colinton
the minister, Mr. Nimmo, was found among the
latter, and though receiving no support from his
congregation he held the living for four years
under Episcopacy, but upon the death of Claver-
house at Killicrankie * and the return of Pj'esby-
terianism in 1691, this " ' Vicar of Bray ' was
deposed by the General Commissione of ye Church
of Scotland."

Sabbath Observance.

There is one pleasing feature of these days of
kirk-session government with all its preciseness,
and that was the way in which the Sabbath had

* William, Prince of Orange, paid a high compliment to
the memory of Dundee, for in being advised to send a great
body of troops to Scotland after the defeat at Killicrankie he
said, '' It is needless, the war ended with Dundee's life."

JOTTINGS FROM THE RECORDS. 147

to be kept. There are very few places even in
Scotland now where one can realise what was
meant by the old Scotch Sabbath. Note the fol-
lowing : —

"Oct. 30, 1650.

Sessione mett, all present. There were delated
for breaking of the Sabath day, John Robinson
and Wm. Edgly, for having out their webs upon
that day at their walk-mills. The kirk officer was
ordered to summon those before ye sessione against
the next day."

" They were appointed to satisfie (i.e. stand on
the pillar) the next Sabath in the publique con-
gregation."

" Sessione mett, Thomas Thomson one of ye
elders told ye sessione yt he saw John Ladly in
Bonalie, setting up his corn upon ye Sabath day,
he is to be cited against ye next sessione day."

" Sessione mett, all present, compeared John
Ladly and confessed yt going by a wet stouke
upon ye Sabath he had set up two sheaves yt
wer lying wet and if he had given any offence to
God or man by it he was sorrie for it and should
not doe ye like again. The sessione dismissed
him. Ninian Denholm appointed to visit ye
paroch during sermon next Lord's day."

There are many other instances all of a similar
nature showing the rigid strictness which the
session demanded the observance of the Sabbath

148 HISTORY OF COLINTON PARISH.

day. It is difficult to imagine how the people
now-a-days would tolerate such righteous dispen-
sations, though it is not much to the credit of the
Scottish people to have deviated from an observance
so beautiful in itself and so much honoured by
their forefathers.

A Solemn Fast.

" This day a Fast was intimated to be kept
ye next Sabath for ye many sins yt abounded
in ye land especially ye contempt of ye Gospell."
*' The moderator reported that his Majesties Secret
Councill's proclamation, Mali 15th was intimated
and was duly kept upon ye said day accordingly.
The causes thereof wer contempt of ye Gospell
shining so gloriously amongst us, ignorance, drunk-
enness, uncleanness, swearing, Sabbath breaking.
The total neglect by some and superficial perform-
ing by others of ye worship of God : That notwith-
standing of vows and engadgments, national and
personal and after severe judgments and signal
mercies, and after solemn humiliations people go
on in yr sins and continue impenitent, hard hearted
and unreformed, unkindly, cold, and wintry like
spring, whereby God threatened to blast our ex-
pectations and houps of the fruits of ye earth, and
to cutt off man and beast by famine : Lastly the
dangerous state of the church both at home and
abroad through the spreading of blaspheous opinions

JOTTINGS FROM THE RECORDS. 149

contrary to and destructive of the fiindimentall
principalis of religion and increase of popery in
diverse places, divisions, &c."

Troublesome Matrons.

" Being the Lord's day, after sermon the elders
mett, all present. There compeared Margt. Sympson
and Christina More against both wch it was proven
by witnesses and so likewise acknowledged by their
owne confession that they had misbehaved them-
selves verie scandalouslie in flyting and miscalling
one another. The parties being removed, the
minister did put it to the vote of ye sessione, if
they shuld not satisfie publickly before the con-
gregatione : but the major part did desire that in
regard this was the first time that anie one of
those had been before oure sessione and one of
them a honest neybour's wife, they shuld make yr
satisfactione only in ye face of the sessione. Where-
upon the parties being called in were sharply
rebuked by the minister and they kneeling upon
yr knees did ask God's forgiveness : and promised
to amend there carriage in tyme coming, to walk
more soberly as became christians."

"Jany. 3, 1664,

This day Wm. Blackie complained of James
Scobie for abusing of him wth his tongue, ye sd
James Scobie is ordained to be cited against ye
next day."

150 HISTORY OF COLINTON PARISH.

" 24th

This day James Scobie compered and was
sharply rebuked before ye sessione being loth to
bring him in public, being but a silly, foolish, brain-
erackt body and had been of tymes befor ane
object of laughter to ye qugregation qu he came
before yem for scandalous carriages."

Tokens.
The use of tokens at the communion season is, as
far as I am aware, a custom peculiar to the Presby-
terian Church of Scotland, and is of great antiquity.

The token, which alone could gain admission to
the Lord's table, was exchanged for membership
cards on the Fast day, which was celebrated during
the week previous to the Communion. The people
considering the obligation of attending church
upon the fast day as binding as upon the Sabbath
day, and many a heartache it gave to the more
stern Presbyterians to see the Fast day converted
into a general holiday as it now is. The following
is an extract relating to this custom : —

JOTTINGS FROM THE RECORDS. 151

"The sessione took under their
consideration some things previous
to the sacrament of the Lord's supper,
incumbent upon the elders such as
Rules to be the making up of differences if any
observed in be, among neighbours (this must have
distributing of been no easy matter and required
tokens, much wisdom) and that in case some

particular persons in this congrega-
tion apply for tokens, they be denyed
them until they first attend the ses-
sione and the sessione be satisfied to
allow them tokens."
Though many things connected vs^ith our Scottish
manners of former times are fast becoming obsolete,
this old custom is still in force in the Parish
Church here. I give an illustration of a token.

Irregular Marriages.

So strict were the orders of the Church that the
proclamation of banns * in order to marriage, which
is now a mere form, were of the first importance.
In these days in which we live objecting to a

* The following is a form of Proclamation of Banns which
was made on three successive Sabbaths —

" Proclamation in order to marriage, James Borthick and
Elizabeth Bog, both residing in this Paroche, Oyez and thats
ae tyme, oyez and thats twa tymes, oyez and thats the third
and last tyme."

152 HISTORY OF COLINTON PARISH.

marriage at its proclamation is a thing never heard
of, but it was not always so. At the period at
which the following extract was written, it was a
very risky matter for an intending bride or bride-
groom to be seen talking to another man or woman
on the street, as it was quite sufficient for the
grounds of an objection, and these objections, you
may be sure, were investigated to the bitter end.
So great a source of annoyance was this that
people naturally betook themselves to some other
process, such as getting Episcopal ministers, who
were then thickly scattered over the land, to marry
them without any preliminaries whatever, of course
this again brought down upon them the censure of
the Church, as note the following : —

" The Session being constituted — Mr. Walter
Allan, Moderator.

John Denholm and Elizabeth Straiton, who
according to an appointment last meeting were
summoned to this diet, being called in, compeared,
were interrogate, whether or no they were married,
answered in the affirmative and produced a certifi-
cate of their marriage the tenour whereof f olloweth.
At Edinburgh, the Eleventh November Jaivise,
(seventeen hundred) and twenty-seven years. The
which day John Denholm, Farmourer in the
Paroch of Colintone, and Elizabeth Straiton, lawful
daughter of Kobert Straiton, Farmourer in Braid,
being single and free persons, not within the for-

JOTTINGS FROM THE RECORDS. 153

bidden degrees, were solemnly married by a minister
of the Gospel known to us, before those witnesses,
James Couper, Wig-maker, in Edinburgh, George
Mitchel, Dyker, these and Mr. John Colme, Seoolmr
in Edinburgh ; ' sic suhscrihur,' James Couper, wit-
ness ; George Mitchell, witness ; Jo. Colme, witness.
The minister in the name of the Session gravely
rebuked them for breaking the order of this Church
and exhorted them to a more orderly walk in all
time coming and they promised to do so, and
mutual adherence to one another, wer dismissed."
The usual fine for this offence was £3 Scots.

Superstitions.

I may here mention a subject which may be
interesting as peculiarly characteristic of the
manners of the people in the seventeenth century.
This was a period in the history of Scotland most
distinguished for the belief in all kinds of imaginary
crime, more particularly the cruel and merciless
persecutions for witch-craft. Though there are
instances where persons were brought before the
session for endeavouring to prove some one a witch,*

* "June : 20 : 168G.

This day Adam Sharpe, in Swanstowne, gave in a bill and

promised to give in a shilling sterling, as ye custome is,

compleaning upon Bessie Broune for calling Grissel Colvine,

his wife, a witch, and that she had taken away her child's

154 HISTORY OF COLINTON PARISH.

we have no record of any witch finding in this
parish, though stories are numerous. Yet the
parish is not altogether free from the gross ignor-
ance and superstition of the times, as you will see
from the following : —

"Mar. : 11 : 1677.

Inter alia. This week was found in ye water
about Sclaitfurd ane young woman about 28 years
of age. It was judged she had been in the water
several weeks. She was known to be William
Young's servant in Woodhall Walk-milne. They
being called for and all ye neighbours about, they
did know yt she was yeir own servant. They said
upon ye fourth of Janr. last in that same year

health by her witchcraft. There were 3 witnesses who com-
peared being called, viz. — Alex. King, Thomas Allan, and
Christian Fluckar, and aflairmed yt they heard her say so, as
was informed by ye said Adam. But ye said Bessie Broune
did not compear that day (who was cited with ye rest to com-
pear) for her child died that same day.

Upon Touesday immediately yr after ye minister visited
Swanstoune Toun and took up yair names for examinatione,
and at that tyme he and 2 of ye elders, viz. — James and Arch.
Watson's, called the said Grissel and Bessie befor yem and
reconceiled yem together. The said Bessie acknowledging
her fault, viz., yt she wronged her neighbour in calling her
a witch as is aforsaid, asking first God's pardone and then
her neighbour's, and promising to live more christianly and
peaceable yrafter. The minister rebuked her sharply and
told her yt if she C(jmmitted ye lyke yrafter she should be put
in ye hands of ye civil magistrate."

JOTTINGS FROM THE RECORDS. 155

there was a little discord betwixt yem and her.
She came away upon ye said day about 12 of
clock in ye day tyrae, and they did never see her
again, and confessed they did not enquire after her
at yeir nearest neighbours. They said they had
nothing of hers but twenty shillings Scots, ane old
plaid and some cloths qch qn, they were seen
they wer thought not worth twelve shillings,
Scots. All the neighbours especially those she served
did lay their hands upon her hut nae blood did
appear. My Lord Collingtoun (the local magis-
trate) to be acquainted w*^ it."

Also in 1680 a woman named Helen Gird wood
a servant in Caldhame, a hamlet which stood to
the south-west of the present Woodhall House, was
accused for the murder of her child on no other
evidence than the following : —

" There was one thing very observable in that
business yt qn ye mother laid her hand upon ye
child's nose there came a little blood from its nose
qch was seen by many present. The woman w*^in
a few days after was sent to the Tolbooth of
Edinburgh qr she yet remains."

"August : 15 : 1680.

The woman Helene Girdwood q* murthered
ye child as is said before was executed at ye Grass-
market in Edinburgh. William Pennie, father
of ye child, after he had appeared before the

156 HISTORY OF COLINTON PARISH.

presbyterie in sackcloth, did stand at ye church
door here in sackcloth, and sat upon ye pillar in
sackcloth half a year and professing a great deal
of grief and sorrow was absolved att ye presbyterie's
desire."

Another of these strange absurdities appears to
be the belief that evil spirits attended and pro-
faned by their blasphemous presence all solemn
ceremonies such as funerals. In order to prevent
this, a part of the beadle's duty was to walk before
the solemn procession with a hand-bell which he
rung furiously from the house of mourning to the
place of interment, in order, I suppose, to scare
such spirits away : —

"Dec. : 8 : 1678.

The sessione appointed yeir Treasurer to buy
ane hand bell to ring before ye dead, which was
accordingly done and thretteen pounds, six shillings
Scots, and eight pennies given for it."

The above purchase is entered in the cash book
as follows — " Item for a hand bell to clink before
ye dead . . . 13 . 6 . 08."

It must have been a rather quaint sight to see
the old beadle set out for a funeral laden as he
would be with the hand-spokes, mortcloth, hand-
bell, and other trappings necessary for the occasion.
The beadle was also undertaker and crier, and
altogether a most important man.

JOTTINGS FROM THE RECORDS. 157

It would be diflScult to convey even a faint idea
of the wretched poverty which prevailed at this
time. The community was divided into only two
classes — the rich and poor, — three-fourths of them
being in absolute poverty. The following Minute
of the Heritors will do more to illustrate this than
anything I can say : —

" The Heritors taking into consideration the
distressing circumstances of the poor of this
parish, proposed that the persens who receive at
present a monthly allowance from the Kirk Session
shall receive that allowance doubled till a sum not
exceeding ten pounds, eight sh. be expended for
that augmentation betwext and harvist next.

Further they resolve with the concurrence of
the Kirk Session, that one thousand Merks Scots
of the poor Fund be furthwith uplifted in order to
purchase a quantity of meal or grain for the relief
of other families in the parish who are in pinching
circumstances, and that this meal shall be sold
something below the present rate of the Mercat as
shall afterwards be determined, and the charge and
management thereof committed to persons to be
nominated, and who are to receive their instruc-
tions from the Heritors.

And appoints that intimation be made from the
pulpit next Sabath that whoever shall incline to
partake of the benefit of this meal shall twext and
Friday next lodge a note of their names and

158 HISTORY OF COLINTON PARISH.

number of persons their families consist of, in the
hands of the Rev. Robt. Fisher."

This was a course which had to be adopted
nearly every year, from May to harvest-time, when
the high price of grain placed even the necessities
of life beyond the reach of all but the affluent.

Items from Cash Books.

The following are a few extracts taken from
cash books belonging to the Kirk Session of
Colinton, beginning in the year 1654. Although
I cannot expect the curious style of book-keeping
to interest you as much as it has done me, I cannot
refrain from enclosing a few of the quaint entries,
and if you could but see the books I am sure you
would say the style was truly, ' single ' entry : —

"September 25, 1654.

John Borthick being Kirk Treasurer from Febr.
1652 by ye Session's orders to the Minister, and
Will Ferguson and Thos. Wishart they wer desired
to tak the pains to mak up his accompts, and
having found them just and to be approved, they
made their report accordingly and did pass the
accompts, at wch tym their wer remaining into ye
box unexpendit — lbs 7, s6, d8.

£1 Scots was = 20d. stg., or Is. Scots = Id. stg.

Lib.

sh.

d.

00

04

00

32

00

00

00

08

00

31

10

00

00

12

00

00

13

00

00

08

00

01

04

00

00

04

00

Lib.

sh.

d.

01

04

00

00

12

00

01

04

00

00

18

00

JOTTINGS FROM THE RECORDS. 159

Imprimis to two crippells

Item for communione elements .

For bringing home same
Item for trees and deals to the scoolhouse .
Item to an English woman *
Item to ane puir scoolar
Item to two lame soldiers
Item to ane distressed gentleman
Item to ane puir man .

Imprimis to a puir scoolar at the college .
Item to John Cahoun for his pains (his

toil) ....

Item to Marion Ochiltry, an object of pitie
Item to Will Stewart, a puir scoolmr
Item to James More, his matrimonall

pledges . . . . 05 16 00

Item 2 gallons and six pynts of ayle to ye

men yt built ye bridge and ye men yt

brought ye sand and lime yrtot

* This shows the generosity of the Session in assisting
even those against whom they had such bitter hatred.

t It appears that the church had indirectly and often
directly, to pay for the erection of all public buildings,
such as harbours, prisons, bridges, &c. The following are
extracts of payments having been made for such: — "Re-
presented by the Moderator that the contribution for build-
ing an Harbour at Eyemouth was in his hands, extending to
six pounds thirteen shillings and six pennies Scots ; " also,
"The Moderator reported that he had delivered the con-
tribution for rebuilding the Tolbooth and steeple of Taine
to Nicol Spence, and had received a discharge therefore."

160 HISTORr OF COLINTON PARISH.

Lib. sh.
Item to John Johnston, beddell, for making

a coffin and grave to Grizell Harper
Item to ane old minister in distress
Item to a distressed widow, a minister's

relic ....

Item for a sand-glass for ye kirk's use
Item to the glassier, a pynt of ayle
Item to George Nicol for mortcloaths

making, and his men drink money
Item to the Reader, his dues .
Item for strae to thack the Reader's house
Item the money collected for christians

taken by ye Turks . . . 40 02 00

Item to Geo. Duncan, troubled w^^ the

gravel! . . . . 00 12 00

Item to John Cahoun for his wark to the

poopit and wainscot the day fors^
Mair for drink to said wark
Item for drink money for cutting com-
munion bread

03

06

00

01

16

00

00

10

00

00

12

00

00

01

08

00

06

00

03

00

00

04

00

00

01

10

00

00

05

04

00

14

00

Lib.

sh.

d.

02

16

00

00

07

00

00

02

00

Imprimis to kirk officer for making a chest

and a grave to Christina Mose, Mary

Samuel's daughter .
Item to Jean Guthrie, a criple .
Item to a Blew Gowne,* being a criple
Item to ane Marg* Stevenson, a criple,

sent thither upon a horse from Currie . 00 08 00

The bridge above referred to, is the bridge which spans
the Water of Leith at the churchyard here. It was erected
about two hundred years ago (1686), the masons at the time
received 1/- Scots or one penny stg. a day, or half-a-peck of
meal as wages.

* See Sir Walter Scott's "Antiquary," chap. iv.

01

09

00

231

00

00

00

16

00

JOTTINGS FROM THE PwECORDS. 161

Lib. sh. d.
Item to James Burton, tenant in Craig-

lockhart, for four thraives of thack at

half a crown the thraive, for repairing

the Reader's house , . . 06 00 00

Item to Mary Irvine, a criple, and carried

from kirk to kirk upon a horse . 00 18 06

Item to W™ Brown who was a great

sufferer in the late times of prelacie, and

was one of those 50 who escaped when

200 were drowned, being put in a leekie

vessell, and suffered a great deal of

cruelty at the hands of the prelates for

his religion
Item for ye communione cups for s^
Item to a woman wrong in her judgment
Item by a woman, name unknown, but

Mr David Hume got the money, he

knowes her name . . . 00 05 00

Item by cash to the woman whose name

Mr David Hume knows . . 00 07 00

Item by that woman, whose name is Price

or Rice, I know not which, but Mr

David Hume got the money . . 00 05 00

Lib. sh. d.
Imprimis to Walter Waters as a part of an

accompt of one pound nine shillings stg.

for seats* and stair to common loftf . 03 00 GO

* At this date (1750) pews were beginning to be intro-
duced : previous to this, each one had to bring their own
chair or stool. A little before this date I find the following
entry in the Minute-book : — ' ' This day Isabel Colquhon
was deleted for desturbing her neighbours about her in
time of sermon by placing the chairs about her in what

Lib.

sh.

d.

: 00

02

00

GO

02

00

00

07

06

00

02

06

00

02

00

00

02

CO

162 HISTORY OF COLINTON PARISH

Communion Expenses —

Item Removing seats &c. in body of ye kirk 00
Item Setting up and taking down ye tent :
Item to singing without and within
Item to kirk officer
Item to doorkeepers
Item to poor strangers

Samma 00 18 00

manner she thinks fit, orders she be cited to the next
dyet." "Isabel Colquhon being summoned to this dyet,
being called and compearing was charged in the terms of
the delation last sedurent, to which the said'Isabel answered
that she being the oldest possessor of a chair in ye body of
ye kirk she thought that her neighbours in Bonailie should
have more respect to her than to toss her chair up and
down ye kirk as they often did and that all the noice she
made was to get back her chair where it had stood for three
score of years, but would be aware of doing the like in
tyme coming. She being removed, the session agreed to
rebuke her this tyme, and she being called in was rebuked
accordingly." This would make the old lady about 80, and
her name appears nearly twenty years after for some similar
offence. Like —

" Marjory o' the mony lochs,
A carline auld and teuch."

t The common loft was the gallery of the church, and
was entered in those days from the outside.

+ This item refers to the tent erected in the churchyard
on Communion days. The demand for seats had been much
in excess to the church accommodation, a state of aiiairs
very different from "the times we live in." The singing
" without and within," refers to the same.

JOTTINGS FROM THE RECORDS. 163

"At Hailes Church, Oct. 16, 1701.

Inter alia. — The late Treasurer, William Deu-
holm, desired that according to the session's
promise, he might be discharged of his intro-
missions, which request the session having heard,
granted the same, and appointed a discharge to be
given him, the tenour whereof followes : —

We, the Moderator, and remanent members of the
kirk session of Haills, having carefully examined
the accompts of William Denholm, late treasurer,
from the time of his entrie, viz. from October 25,
1697 untill the 9th of this instant, inclusive of
both, and so find that he has been verie faithfull
and diligent in the discharge of that trust, and
therefore, we by their presents discharge him of
all his intromissions and promise to hold good and
valide this our discharge against all deadly, as law
will. In witness whereof we have subscribed
these presents (written by Mr Thomas Johnston,
session clerk), at Collingtoune alias Haills, this
16 of October 1701. Sic subscriber — Walter Allan,
Edward Burton, James Davie, and David Denholm.
Reported by the Moderator, that the last Lord's
day according to the order of the presbyterie, he
had read from the pulpit the Acts of the General
Assembly against abuses at Lykwakes, pennie-
briddells, and promiscuouses dancing.

The Sederunt closed with prayer."

164 HISTORY OF COLINTON PARISH.

Yet again, for one delights to dwell upon the
thoughts of those halcyon days, those times of
primaeval simplicity, it might be interesting to
notice the curious ways the session had for raising
money for their use. The first of course was the
regular weekly collection, which however only
amounted to an average of about 5/- an evidence
of voluntaryism being at a low ebb. The next
lucrative would be the mort-cloth charges. " For
the use of ye larger 3/- and ye smaller 18/- Scots."
This, curious to say, was compulsory, no one being
allowed to bury without it as we find a certain
Jams Ross being told to desist from lending some-
thing of the kind he had to his neighbours " ye
session considering that ye poor had been seriously
prejudiced yrby."

A collection was also taken at funerals for the
poor, and a charge of 14/- Scots for ringing the
" great bell."

Another scource of revenue was the " pledge
dollars " or rather " matrimonials paunds." This
was a charge made by the session clerk amounting
usually to 8/4 or £5 Scots, when parties gave in
their names for proclamation of banns and which
the parties forfeited if anything unworthy occurred
such as a birth within nine months after marriage,
and I am sorry to say the session minutes give us
every reason to think that these were, alas, too
often lost, and that this was a profitable transaction
for the session.

JOTTINGS FROM THE RECORDS. 165

Then over and above the usual 12/- Scots paid
for the poor at the marriage ceremony, a collection
was also taken, the following " Act " passed by the
session in February 1683, throws some light upon
this.

THE ACT.

" Whereas for severall bygone years it has been
in practice to ye prejudice of ye poor yt qt money
has been contributed at marriages in our kirk, was
by a gratuitie confer'd upon ye officer of ye kirk
and consequently his private interest preferred
befor ye publick interest of ye poor. The Sessione
yrfor thought fit to enact and ordain yt no such
bade custome be practised for ye tyme to come,
prohibiting and discharging ye kirk officer to
intromett wth ye marriage money in appropriating
it to himself but yt it be put in ye kirk box for ye
use of ye poor.

The occasion of ye sessions making this Act is
yair serious consideratione yt ye poor has been
formerly prejudiced, and also to guard against
dissimulatione in ye collector for ye said money
in ye meantyme his saying one thing and meaning
another. Collecting only for ye kirk officer under
pretense it was to ye poor."

Such then were the customs when money raising
evidently was considered the greatest of christian
graces.

166 HISTORY OF COLINTON PARISH.

I would take the liberty here, before I close, of"
saying a few words of explanation You may have
observed that little or nothing has been said about
the Parish between the dates 1750 and 1850. The
reason of this is that the Kirk-Session Records,
from which one can gather a great deal of infor-
mation about the parish generally, begin at the
former date to adhere closely to church aifairs, and
the parish not figuring in history, we are almost
obliged to pass at once from the one date to the
other.

The Kirk-Session and Heritors jointly continued
to administer the laws relating to the poor, and
also the laws relating to education, until the
Poor-Law (Scotland) Act of 1845 established the
Parochial Board — a Board composed of all the
proprietors in the parish whose rental amounted
to £20 and upwards, and the Education (Scotland)
Act of 1872 established the School Boards.

The Parochial Boards when first established
embraced also the Local Authority who had the
administration of Sanitary and other laws, a
subject then only beginning to attract attention,
until the passing of the Local Government (Scot-
land) Act of 1889, when those duties passed into
the hands of the County Council, a popularly
elected body, having the administration of all
affairs relating to the County.

" Again in 1894 another Local Government Act

JOTTINGS FROM THE RECORDS. 167

was passed which again reformed the constitution
of the body entrusted with the Poor Law Adminis-
tration of 1845 and the Parish Council also a
popular elected body was constituted. And just
as the Act of 1889 facilitated that of 1894 by
reforming Parish boundaries, so the Act of 1894
" provides a method by which the areas constituted
for parochial administration may, where dissimilar,
be gradually assimilated to those constituted for
educational purposes, and the way thus prepared
for the future concentration of all Parish affairs,
including education in the hands of a single body."
And now, my dear Sir, I have in a manner
completed the task I had imposed upon myself in
affording you an opportunity of acquiring a know-
ledge of the Parish History. I say so, because I
do not wish that you should stop at what you may
have found here (that is to say if you have borne
with my tediousness thus far), nor do I wish you
to take upon my authority things that should
be the subject of your own investigation. My
wish is that it may stimulate your curiosity and
encourage your exertion for further revelations by
tlius giving you something merely suggestive, not
exhaustive.

INDEX.

Area

Anderson, Rev. Harry
Abererombie, Sir Ralph
Anderson, Samuel
Alison, Sir Archibald
Act for Settling Schools

1

Davies of Torphin

71

Denholms

91

Dunbar, our Quota at

104

m

123

Episcopal Church
Elliot, WiUie

Boundaries

Burns

Badds

Belfrage, Dr.

Bonaly

Balfour, Rev. Lewis

Burtons, The

Biographical

Bonaly Tower

Colinton Village . 10, 25

Cromwell . 11, 96

Covenanters . 12

Cholera . . 27

Craiglockhart Church 67

Colinton House ■ . 77

Comus Stone . 96

Comiston . 98

Craiglockhart Fortalice 99

Cockburn, Lord , 6, 72, 106

Dick, Dr. . 27, 63

Dreghorn . 92

Drummond, George . 105
M

1

6

10

27, 64

2, 10, 91

56

127

77

105

Fleming, Rev. John .
Falconer, Rev. Hugh
Fuulis, Sir James
Forbes, Sir William .
Forbes, Professor David
Forrest's of Comiston
Famine .

Generalities
Gillespie, James
Gray's Mill
Gladstone, Mr.

Honest Men
Hailes Quarry
Hailes House
Heritors' Names in 1739
Hunter, Robert, A.M.

Pafc'e.
127
127
141

75
132

55
74
78
81
86
98
157

1
19

28
74

10

29

103

128
134

Industry . . 8

Irregular Marriages . 151

Inventory of Church Goods 144

Items from Old Cash-Books 158

Jubilee Address

23

170

INDEX.

Juniper Green

fage.
32

Parish Council

Page.
167

Juniper Green U.F. Church 71
Jottings from the Records 137

Quaint Inscriptions .

49

Jouges

139

Reservoirs

6

Kirk-Session Finance

164

Rullion Green
Redford .

14
96

Lockhart, Dr.

60

Redhall .

99

Lockhart, Sir Simon

99

Russell, James

135

Lockhart, Lord-President 114

Slateford .

10,27

Mackenzie, Henry .

17

Swanston

10,38

Macwhirter, John

29

Snufif Mill

33

Masson, Professor

33

Stevenson, R. L.

39

Munsie, Rev. Wm. .

66

Slateford U.F. Church

61

Mortsafe .

52

St. Margaret's Church

69

Muir, Rev. G. S. .

66

Stewart, Williamina B.

83

M'Neil, Rev. Chas. .

74

Scott, Sir Walter .

82

Mallet, David

93

Schools and Schoolmasters 116

Macfie, R. A.

95

Sabbath Observance .

146

Mortcloth

144

Solemn Fast

148

Names of Parish

3

Superstitions

153

Otterburn, Sir Adam

99

Thomson, Rev. Wm.

Troublesome Matrons

66
149

Population

9

Tokens .

150

Play, The
Prince Charles
Parish Church
Parish Ministers

22
28
45
54

Valuation
Value of Money
"Vicar of Bray "

9
120
145

Pitcairn, David

92

Walker, Dr.

54

Picts and Scots

96

Woodhall House

34

Proclamation of Ban

us 151

Woodhall, Lord

36

Parochial Board

166

Woodvale

114

:^