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34. KELBURNE HOUSE, Ayr.-(For description see Preface.) 35. KELSO ABBEY, Roxburgh.-The West Front

36.

37. 38.

...

North Transept, externally

Northern Doorway.

Interior of the South Side

Woodcut Arcade of the North Transept

39. KILDRUMMIE CASTLE, Aberdeen.-The Chapel End and Round Tower

Woodcut: External View

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THE CATHEDRAL OF ST. MUNGO, GLASGOW.

Ar the northern extremity of the city of Glasgow, on an elevated and solitary spot, to which the noise of the busy swarming town scarcely penetrates, stands the Cathedral of St. Mungo, the noblest unmutilated specimen of ecclesiastical architecture in Scotland. To reach it the traveller has to pass through a line of sordid filthy streets; and its first appearance is not inviting, from the unfortunate predominance of the north-western Tower, or Belfry, the upper portion of which is the work of a comparatively late period. It is from a point near the north-western extremity that the full effect of the building is most satisfactorily felt. Its predominant characters are height and length, and the details are so arranged as, with wonderful felicity, to aid these features. The roofs, both of the aisles and of the central departments, have a very abrupt slope, and the windows, in the style generally denominated the Early English, are narrow and lancet-shaped. The transept projects so little beyond the aisle, that the building scarcely presents the usual cruciform ground plan, and thus the long perspective is scarcely broken. A considerable descent of the ground towards the east adds greatly to the elevation of the choir and to the general loftiness of the structure; and if there be any portion of it which does not aid this prevailing character, it is the spire, evidently of a later date than the rest of the building, and characterised by the canopied windows of a more florid style of architecture. The individual parts of the exterior are not profusely ornamented; but the windows, buttresses, and gurgoiles are so numerous as to impart great richness to the solemn dignity of the old undecorated Gothic. The silence of the place, and the multitude of tombs with which the old grave-yard is paved, are in full harmony with the character of the edifice. Near its eastern extremity, in a deep hollow, runs a stream, and on the opposite bank rise, tier above tier, the hundreds of tombs of the modern Necropolis, appearing like a vast and indefinite continuation of the original grave-yard, and certainly seen to greater advantage through the uncertainty of distance, than on a nearer approach. The southern side, exhibiting some details of a later style of architecture, is inferior in simple grandeur to the northern; but a small low edifice, with groined arches, intended apparently as the basement story or crypt of a continuation of the transept, will strike the stranger who climbs up and peeps through its only window, with the richness of its interior decorations. A feature of the exterior that must not be omitted is, a line of massive gurgoiles, of very expressive character, consisting each of a monstrous open mouth, on the lower jaw of which a grotesque face is represented in bas-relief.

Entering by a wide door on the south, the first object likely to be noticed is the rich screen separating the choir from the rest of the building, which the accompanying engraving renders it unnecessary to describe. The gloomy low-browed arches to the right lead to the crypt, which the

reader will remember to have been so powerfully described by Sir Walter Scott in Rob Roy, as a place of worship in the early part of the eighteenth century. It occupies the whole area beneath the choir and the chapter house, and, as the level of the ground declines in this direction, a considerable mass of light passes to the interior. It is quite insufficient, however, to detract from an intense feeling of solemnity, to which, at the same time, the luxuriance and symmetrical solidity of the groined arching impart a sense rather of admiring awe than of gloom. There are two flights of steps between the extremities of the crypt. In the woodcut the central portion is represented, with the monument of St. Kentigern. The engraving represents a cross view, from a point under the south arch of the choir.

The choir itself is represented by the accompanying outline engraving, divested of the gallery and pews used to adapt it to a modern place of worship, and of many adjuncts very foreign to its original character. A partially stained glass partition, at the eastern extremity, has been omitted, and the view is carried straight through to the Lady Chapel, the beautiful proportions of which are presented in detail in another plate. The clustered pillars of the choir have rich alto-relievo flowered capitals, while those of the Lady Chapel and the nave are plain. The latter, now no longer used as a church, is remarkable for its lofty effect; its

HISTORICAL NOTICE.

In the legends of the saints embodied in the ancient liturgy of the Scottish Catholic Church, it is stated that an Episcopal see was founded at Glasgow by St. Kentigern or Mungo, whose name the present edifice has subsequently borne. The period assigned to St. Mungo's deaththe commencement of the seventh century-makes him a contemporary of St. Columba, the Apostle of the Highlanders. Glasgow was then within the district to which, though their identity is matter of dispute, the names of Cumbria and Strathclyde have been indifferently applied; and the people are supposed to have, at that early period, been of the original British or Welsh race. When this separate state was dissolved, in the subsequent partition of its territory, Scotland absorbing the northern portion while the southern was attached to the Saxon division of the island, this ancient bishopric is said to have disappeared. The place where it stood, still venerated, was chosen as the site of the Cathedral of the West, when Scotland became a distinct kingdom, with a separate race of kings. It does not appear that any portion of the original edifice then existed, but it is said that an ancient stone cross-probably like the rudely sculptured and very ancient effigies of that symbol found throughout Scotland and Ireland—still marked the spot as sacred ground; and a Cistertian Monk of Furnes, who wrote the life or Legend of St. Kentigern, commemorates the "pleasant shade" cast by some venerable trees, by which it was encompassed.

The erection, or restoration of the Bishopric, was one of those acts of ecclesiastical munificence of David I. which made his successor, James VI., call him "a sair saunt to the crown." The building was commenced before the year 1124: the consecration took place on 7th July, 1136, and the pious monarch graced the occasion by his presence, attended by a brilliant train of followers. This erection was burned down in 1192, and it is believed, by local antiquaries who have carefully examined some fragments of mouldings and incrustations lately dug up, that from the purely Norman style of architecture to which they belong, they were a portion of this so early destroyed edifice. The rebuilding must have been speedily begun, and vigorously pursued; for we find that a new edifice was consecrated by Bishop Jocelin on 6th July, 1197. To aid him with funds for this great work, the bishop, with the consent of the abbots, priors and other clergy of the diocese, erected a guild or fraternity, with authority to collect money, sanctioned by royal letters, which, as still preserved, are found to describe the compassion with which the king beheld "the desolation which had fallen on the See of Glasgow-that church which, though poor and lowly of temporal estate, was the spiritual mother of many tribes." This is supposed to have allusion to the mixed population of the West of Scotland at that period, consisting of Normans, Saxons, Scots from Ireland represented by the present Highlanders, some remnants of the original British race, and a tribe distinct from them all, called "Men of Galloway."

In the new edifice a tomb was erected to the memory of St. Kentigern, and an altar was attached to it, to which many votive offerings were presented, among the earliest of which was a gift of a stone of wax yearly for candles for a daily mass to be celebrated at the altar of the tomb. His bones were long believed to be kept in the reliquary of the cathedral, which also professed to contain relics of the Virgin Mary, of St. Bartholomew the Apostle, St. Ninian of Galloway,

In 1242, a provincial council of the Scottish clergy assembled at Perth, passed a canon for promoting the building of the cathedral. It ordained that in all the churches of the realm, on every Sunday and holiday between Ash Wednesday and the first Sunday after Easter, the object of the canon should, after the reading of the gospel in the mass, be carefully and diligently expounded to the parishioners in their vernacular language. It was at the same time to be explained to them that the contributors to this work would receive certain indulgences, a list of which was appointed to be hung up in every church. Each parochial clergyman was enjoined to pay the alms and legacies he received in the course of this collection, to his rural dean at the first meeting of his chapter. The old Scottish chroniclers note particularly the progress which the works had made during the episcopate of William of Burdington, extending from 1233 to 1258. In the year 1270, the chapter obtained from the Lord of Luss the privilege of cutting timber in the forests along the western bank of Loch Lomond, for the construction of a spire or belfry for the cathedral. This work was not completed thirty years later, when it became associated with a curious historical incident. Bishop Robert Wishart, who was consecrated in 1272, was called the "warlike bishop." He was appointed one of the lords of the regency on the death of Alexander III. He attended the celebrated meeting before Edward I. at Norham, where he distinguished himself by denying that the King of England had any signorial right over Scotland, and stated that his arbitration on the descent of the crown was merely desired as that of a neighbouring prince, in whose wisdom and integrity the Scots could place reliance. King Edward charged the bishop with having repeatedly sworn fealty to the English crown; but he was a resolute opponent of the claims of England, and not content with using the influence of his own profession, he reaped no small fame in the field. He was a partisan of Wallace. He granted absolution to Bruce for stabbing the treacherous Comyn beside the high altar in the convent of the Minorite Brethren in Dumfries: and he afterwards followed the fortunes of that prince. King Edward charged this bishop with having obtained timber for the construction of the spire, for which it appears that the cuttings in the forest of Luss were insufficient, and with afterwards diverting it from its ecclesiastical purpose to construct with it engines of war for besieging the castle of Kirkintilloch when in possession of the English. The "warlike bishop” was taken prisoner in the year 1306, while defending Cupar against the English. He became blind during his captivity, and was not liberated until after the battle of Bannockburn. He died in 1316. In reference to this period of history, it may be remembered that Edward I. resided in Glasgow in the year 1301, and, as if desirous to contrast his own reverence for the church with the conduct of the bishop, he made many offerings at the shrine of St. Kentigern.

It is probable that the wooden spire was not completed until many years after the conclusion of the war of independence. In the year 1400 it was struck by lightning and burned to the ground. The erection of a stone structure to supply its place was immediately projected, and this work was commenced, and carried as far, at least, as the first battlement, by Bishop William Lauder, who died in the year 1425, after having also laid the foundation of the vestry, beneath the chapter house, at the north-east corner of the choir. Both the works commenced by this bishop were carried on by his successor, John Cameron, whose episcopate lasted to the year 1447. It would appear that the chapter house was completed in 1457, when a convocation of the University of Glasgow, then newly founded, was held within it. The northern aisle was roofed in during the episcopate of Bishop Muirhead, which extended from 1455 to 1473.

It was during the reign of King James IV. who held the honorary title of a Canon of the Cathedral, that Glasgow was converted into a Metropolitan see, in the year 1491. The Bishops