Memorials of Edinburgh in the olden time Volume 2

This historic book may have numerous typos and missing text. Purchasers can download a free scanned copy of the original book (without typos) from the publisher. Not indexed. Not illustrated. 1891 Excerpt: ...a youth who long after sat on the bench under the title of Lord Monboddo, gazed as the wretched Porteous was dragged to the scene of his crime on the night of the 7th September 1736; and near by stood the booth at which the rioters paused, and with ostentatious deliberation purchased the rope wherewith he was hung. Nor must we forget, among its most durable memorabilia, the wizards and ghosts who claimed possessions in its mysterious alleys, maintaining their rights in defiance of the march of intellect, and only violently ejected at last when their habitations were tumbled about their ears. This curious zigzag steep was undoubtedly one of the most ancient streets in the old town, and probably existed as a roadway to the Castle while Edwinsburgh was comprised in a few mud and straw huts scattered along the higher slope. Enough still remains of it to show how singularly picturesque and varied were the tenements with which it once abounded. At the corner of the Lawnmarket is an antique fabric, reared ere Newton's law of gravitation was dreamt of, and seeming rather like one of the mansions of Laputa, whose builders had discovered the art of constructing houses from the chimney-tops downward! A range of slim wooden posts sustains a pile that at every successive story shoots farther into the street, until it bears some resemblance to an inverted pyramid. It is a fine example of an old burgher dwelling. The gables and eaves of its north front, which appear in the engraving of the Weigh-House, are richly carved, and the whole forms a remarkably striking specimen, the finest that now remains, of an ancient timber land. Next comes a stone land, with a handsome polished ashlar front and gabled attics of the time of Charles I. Irregular string-courses decorate the wa...