ductive of so much misery in many other of the great towns of the kingdom. Printing and publishing are carried on to a large extent. In this department of industry Edinburgh far surpasses all the towns of the kingdom, London only excepted; many of the most valuable and popular works of the age emanating from the Edinburgh press.* Shawls and ale are also among the celebrated productions of the place; and there has recently been established, on the banks of the Union Canal, a very extensive manufactory for the spinning of silk. Printing papers are manufactured to a large extent in the neighbourhood, but none of the mills are in the immediate vicinity of the city. Although there are several other branches of manufacture, they are, for the most part, on an insignificant scale.

As a place of family residence, Edinburgh possesses many advantages. The climate, although it cannot be called mild or genial, is yet eminently salubrious. The annual quantity of rain is moderate, compared with the fall upon the western coast. The violent winds, to which the city is exposed by its elevated situation, are by no means unfavourable to general health, as they carry the benefit of a thorough ventilation into the close-built lanes and alleys of the Old Town. The facilities of education, and the advantages of cultivated society, have been already alluded to. In the former of these particulars, we believe it to be unequalled in the kingdom, and in the latter it can be surpassed by London alone.

* The Edinburgh Review, the Encyclopedia Britannica, Blackwood's Maga. zine, Tail's Magazine, the Medical Journal, the Journal of Agriculture, and the Philosophical Journal, are some of the more important periodical publications. In circulation it is worthy of remark, that both Blackwood's and Tait's Magazines far exceed any of their London contemporaries.

There are twelve newspapers, of which two are published thrice a-week, five twice a-week, and the rest weekly.

The markets are liberally supplied with all the necessaries and luxuries of the table. White fish are more especially abundant, cod, haddocks, and, at certain seasons, herrings, being sold at a very low price. Coal of good quality is found in the immediate neighbourhood of the city, and there is a copious supply of excellent water. Upon the whole, it would be difficult to name a city which unites so many social advantages, and where a person of cultivated mind and moderate fortune could pass his time more agreeably.

The most convenient mode of imparting information to strangers, is to select a particular district of the city to be perambulated, describing the objects of interest on the way. With this view, we shall visit all the more important public buildings and institutions in successive walks, adding in notes such collateral or subordinate information as may appear necessary to convey a more accurate idea of the city and its institutions, as well as other matter which may tend to enliven the dulness of dry topographical details.

WALK FIRST.

REGISTER-HOUSE—THEATRE-ROYAL STAMP OFFICE—POST OFFICEPRISON—BRIDEWELL—CALTON HILL—STEWART'S MONUMENT OBSERVATORY-PLAYFAIR'S MONUMENT CAMERA OBSCURA—NELSON'S MONUMENT—NATIONAL MONUMENT—HIGH SCHOOL BURNS'S MONUMENT—HOLYROOD PALACE—HOLYROOD ABBEY—ARTHUR'S SEAT -HOUSE OF JOHN KNOX—NORTH BRIDGE.

The central situation of the building, and the large number of hotels in its neighbourhood, points out

THE REGISTER HOUSE

as an appropriate starting point. This handsome edifice, designed by the celebrated Robert Adam, is the Depository of the Public Records.* It forms a square of 200

*This important establishment includes various offices, such as the offices of the Clerks and Extractors of the Court of Session, of the Jury Court, and of the Court of Justiciary, the office of the Great and Privy Seal, of the Chancery, the Lord Lyon's office, the Bill-Chamber, &c. But it is most celebrated for the different Registers which are there kept, and from which it derives its name. The most important and useful of these are the Registers of Sasines, of Inhibitions, and of Adjudications.

When a party wishes either to dispose absolutely of a landed estate in Scotland, or to grant a security over it, (such as an heritable bond,) it is necessary for him not only to grant a conveyance of the property to the purchaser or creditor, as the case may be, but also to give him Infeftment or Sasine, which is a symbolical delivery of the lands. An instrument of Sasine is then written out by a notary, which must be recorded within sixty days in the Register of Sasines. And, in the case of a competition, it is not the party whose conveyance or instrument of Sasine is first in date, but the party whose Sasine is first recorded, who is preferred to the property. The Sasine may be recorded either in the General Register for all Scotland, which is kept in the Register-House at Edinburgh, or in the particular Register for the County where the lands lie. These County Registers are transmitted at stated periods to the Keeper of the Records in Edinburgh.

This is the manner in which a party voluntarily divests himself of his lands; but there are also two kinds of diligence,—Inhibition and Adjudication,—by which an individual's heritable property may be affected without his consent. By the former, a debtor is prohibited from conveying or burdening his property to the prejudice of the creditor using the inhibition; by the latter, he is divested of the property, which, by a decree of the court, is declared to belong to his creditor, in satisfaction of his debt. An inhibition must be recorded within forty days of its date, either in the General Register of Inhibitions at Edinburgh, or in the Particular Register for the County, which, like the County Registers of Sasines, arc transmitted at stated periods to the Keeper of the Records at Edinburgh. An abbreviate of a decree of adjudication must be recorded within sixty days of its date, in a register kept in the Register-House for that purpose, called the Register of Abbreviates of Adjudication.

A party, therefore, who wishes either to purchase a property or make a Joan over it, may, by a search of the Registers of Sasines, Inhibitions, and Adjudications, ascertain whether there has been any previous sale or conveyance of it by the proprietor or his predecessors—to what extent it may be burdened with heritable debts—whether the proprietor has been prohibited by inhibition from granting any voluntary conveyance—or whether there has been any judicial assignation of it by adjudication. It is a principle of the Scotch law, that no party who has possessed a property upon an heritable title for forty years, shall be disquieted in his possession thereafter; and, also, that any party who may have possessed a title to a property without insisting in or prosecuting it for a period of forty years, shall be hold to have abandoned his right. A forty

feet, surmounted by a dome of fifty feet diameter. It contains upwards of 100 apartments for the transaction of public business. Among these the great room, in which the older records are deposited, is distinguished for its handsome proportions. Admission can only be obtained by an introduction to some of the public officers. Directly opposite the east end of the Register House, stands

THE THEATRE ROYAL.

Its exterior is plain almost to meanness, but its internal accommodation is excellent. Its management is unexceptionable, the manager, Mr. W. H. Murray, being equally esteemed for his distinguished ability in his profession, and for the virtues and accomplishments of his private life.*

Proceeding due east we enter Waterloo Place, and on the right pass successively the Stamp Office, and the Post Office. The lightness of the open colonnades on either side of the street are generally much admired by English strangers. It was upon entering this street, and contemplating the Calton Hill before him, that George IV. exclaimed, in royal rapture, "How superb!" Still advancing in the same direction, we reach the stair leading to the Calton Hill, from the top of which may be seen, in the churchyard across the street, the circular tower erected as a monument to David Hume, the Historian. The Prison is immediately to the east of the churchyard, years' search of the records, showing no incumbrances, is therefore generally considered sufficient evidence that the property is not liable to any burden or ground of eviction, and that any one may with safety either purchase it or lend money on its security. No such assurance of the safety of a transaction, relative to landed property, can be obtained in England, nor probably in any other country in Europe.

* A smaller theatre, under the same management, is open during the sum mer months. It stands at the head of Leith Walk, but possesses no architectural attraction.

and a little further along, in the same direction, is BRIDEWELL. To both of these institutions strangers are admitted, by orders from any of the magistrates of the city, which there is no difficulty in procuring.

Upon the left hand, in ascending the second flight of steps to the hill, is the graceful Monument to Dugald Stewart, a reproduction, with some variations, of the Choragic monument of Lysicrates. For the design of this monument, Edinburgh is indebted to the classical taste of Mr. Playfair. Close by are The Observatory, and Monument to Professor Playfair. In the Old Observatory, an unshapely building, occupying a prominent position a little to the west, is a Camera Obscura, accessible to strangers by an order from any of the subscribers. Upon the summit of the hill stands Nelson's Monument, a structure more ponderous than elegant, "modelled exactly after a Dutch skipper's spy-glass, or a butter churn,"* but which, from the grandeur of its site, and greatness of dimensions, must be admitted to possess those attributes of sublimity which are independent of grandeur of design. The prospect from the top of the monument is very fine; the admission fee is threepence for each person. Near Nelson's Monument are the twelve columns of the National Monument. The object proposed by the erection of this structure, was the commemoration of the heroes who fell at Waterloo. The splendour of the intended building, (which was to be a literal restoration of the Parthenon',) was worthy of so patriotic a cause, but, unfortunately, the architectural taste of the projectors was far in advance of the pecuniary means at their disposal, and the monument consequently remains unfinished. It cannot fail to be lamented,

* The Modern Athens. By a Modern Greek. London, 1825.