EDINBURGH, from sainT ANTHON’YS CHAPEL. 155 native Scotsmen, the mildness of our law respecting personal duresse making it scarce worth the debtor's while to fly to the sanctuary, nor worth that of the creditor to throw him into a prison, from which (if no fraud is alleged against him) he is sure to be liberated after a brief confinement. The gardens, etc., in the vicinity of the Abbey of Holyrood House, with all the remaining offices, have of course suffered by the negligence which has permitted the building itself to run into disrepair, and the chapel to fall into ruins. The Botanical Garden was originally established there, but it has been long removed to a more favourable situation. Were the spirit of the haughty Duke of York to revisit the scenes he once inhabited, the apostrophe of Shakspeare, most applicable in all its parts to the present state of this ancient palace, might be addressed to the phantom by those whose disastrous circumstances make them the inmates of the sanctuary : "Alas! and what shall York see here But empty lodgings, and unfurnish'd walls, And what cheer find for welcome but our groans ?" Richard II. EDINBURGH, FROM SAINT ANTHONY'S CHAPEL. THE view is taken from Saint Anthony's Chapel, of which a shattered ruin rises on the shoulder of Arthur's Seat. It belonged to the cell of a hermit, the vestiges of which still remain near to the chapel. The ruins are crumbling fast to decay, and have already lost a tower, which, in the time of Maitland, still adorned the western end. The site of the hermitage and chapel are chosen with striking propriety; and seem, as becomes the abode of ascetic devotion, to frown from their rugged and lofty site upon the abode of Scottish monarchy, and the noise and tumult of the capital, placed, as it were, above the vanities of human life, yet having them full in view. The history of the hermitage has not been handed down to us. The chapel has been a plain but handsome Gothic building. A high rock rises behind the cell, from the foot of which gushes a pure and plentiful fountain, dedicated of course to Saint Anthony, the Genius Loci. It is mentioned in a beautiful and well-known Scottish song, "Now Arthur's Seat sall be my bed, The sheets sall ne'er be fyled by me; REGALIA OF SCOTLAND. THE date of the various articles of the regalia can be precisely ascertained, excepting only that of the CROWN, Concerning which something is left to conjecture. Neither does this doubt relate to the crown as it at present appears, because it is certain that the arches, ball, and cross, which close and surmount the original coronet or diadem, were added to it by James V.; so that the question only remains, to what era we ought to refer the diadem itself, which is unquestionably of a date more ancient than the additions made to it. There is a natural inclination in the mind to ascribe the date of so remarkable a relic to a period of national triumph, and its formation to the commands of a victorious and patriotic monarch: we cannot, therefore, wonder at the fond desire which Scottish antiquaries have shown to refer the date of this diadem, in the language of national song, to "Days when gude KING ROBERT rang." And although no direct proof can be produced that this was actually the case, the following circumstances seem to render the conjecture highly probable. There can be no doubt, that, from an early period, the Scottish, like other European nations, used the crown as a symbol of royalty, and accordingly their historians mention on various occasions the ceremony of coronation at the Abbey of Scone; but the crown used on these occasions, with every other emblem of royalty, was taken from John Baliol by Edward I. of England, in the year 1296. The ceremony of degradation was performed in the Castle of Montrose (or Brechin, according to other authorities), where the unfortunate Baliol was produced before Edward, dressed in the full robes, and adorned with all the ensigns of royalty. The garments were stripped from him one by one: the lining of ermine was torn from his royal vest, from which he acquired the ignominious nickname of Toomtabart, or Empty Cout-the sceptre, sword, crown, and ring, were then severally taken from him, and the degraded monarch was compelled, by the symbol of delivering a white wand, to yield up to Edward his full right of sovereignty.* It cannot be doubted that the English king retained possession of these royal insignia, since he was at the pains to transport to London the celebrated marble stone used at the coronation of the Scottish kings,—an emblem of his victorious usurpation neither so valuable nor so portable. If farther proof were wanting of the English monarch having car The original account of this mortifying ceremony, as given by the Prior of Lochleven, may be found in the Appendix to this description. No. I. March 29, 1306. ried off or destroyed the regalia of Scotland in the year 1296, it arises out of the fact, that when Bruce first asserted his right to the crown of Scotland, and was crowned king at Scone, a temporary circle, or coronel of gold, was used for that purpose, which would have been unnecessary had the ancient Regalia existed, or been within his reach. Even this temporary badge of royalty fell into the hands of the English after Bruce's defeat at the battle of Methven, exactly three months after June 19, his coronation. The golden crownlet, after Bruce's defeat and flight, appears for a time to have been concealed by one Geoffrey de Coigners, to whose care it had probably been intrusted. These circumstances we learn from the tenor of pardon issued by King Edward to Coigners, at the instance of Queen Margaret of England.* 1306. It is certain, therefore, that when the victor of Bannockburn assumed the absolute sovereignty of his dominions, there was no Scottish crown in existence, since that used by his predecessors, as well as the coronel made for his own coronation, had both fallen into the hands of the English. Of their subsequent fate we are entirely ignorant; nor does it clearly appear what measures were ever afterwards taken for their restoration to Scotland. It is indeed sufficiently ascertained, that at the Peace of Northampton, in 1328, it was agreed that the famous stone of Scone, on which the kings of Scotland were wont to sit at their coronation, should be restored to the Scots: † and it seems difficult to suppose that a similar stipulation had not been made for the restitution of the Scottish regalia; unless, perhaps, they had been destroyed during the interval of the English usurpation. ‡ Certain it is, that if any such condition was made, it was not complied with in the case of the regalia, any more than that respecting the Scone, which, notwithstanding the treaty, was still retained in England. The ancient crown of Scotland, therefore, was never restored, which renders it highly probable that the diadem now preserved was made by Bruce's orders, to replace "the golden round Appendix, No. II. There is in the possession of the Dean and Chapter of Westminster, a writ under the Privy Seal of Edward III., dated at Bordesley, in July, 1328, directed to the abbot and convent of Westminster; in which, after reciting that his council had, in his Parliament holden at Northampton, agreed that the stone whereupon the Kings of Scotland used to sit at the time of their coronation, and which was then in the keeping of that abbot and convent, should be sent to Scotland, and that he had ordered the Sheriffs of London to receive the same from them by indenture, and cause it to be carried to the Queen Mother; he commands the abbot and convent to deliver up the said stons to those sheriffs as soon as they should come to them for that purpose.Calendars of Ancient Charters, etc. Introd. p. 58. The different parts of what has been denominated the Treaty of Northampton, from the place of its final ratification by Edward III. and his parliament, were contained in various instruments and indentures, dated, some of them at York, others at Edinburgh. Of these, the principal are now known to be preserved in the public archives of Scotland; but in none of them is there any stipulation either respecting the Scottish egalia, or the stone of Scone.-See the new Edition of RYMER's Fadera. and top of sovereignty," which was the visible emblem of the national independence, recovered by the wisdom and valour of the Scottish deliverer. At the death of Robert Bruce, such a crown was in existence, for his son, David II., held his coronation with unusual solemnity; and it is particularly noticed, that, by the special directions of the Pope, the ceremony of unction was then, for the first time, used in the inauguration of a Scottish monarch. Where new ceremonies were added, the ancient rites were doubtless carefully observed; and it cannot be doubted, therefore, that David was regularly crowned, and with a diadem suited to his dignity, which crown must have been fabricated betwixt the date of the battle of Bannockburn in 1314, and that of David II.'s coronation in 1329. The workmanship of the ancient portion of the present crown, and, in particular, the mode in which the gems are set, betoken great antiquity, and appears at least as early as the fourteenth century, which corresponds with the date of Bruce's reign. After this period, precious stones were usually polished and cut into facets, whereas those of the Scottish crown are set rough, and in their natural state, without any attempts to relieve or improve their appearance by the art of the lapidary. To these observations it may be added, that such representations as exist of the Scottish crown previous to the time of Robert, whether on coins or on the seals of monarchs, are, as far as the rudeness of the delineation enables us to judge, of a different form from that which we are now treating of, and represent a diadem ornamented with fleurs-de-lis only, whereas, from the time of Robert Bruce downwards, the fleurs-de-lis are interchanged with crosses, as on the present crown. The head of David I. at Melrose Abbey, is in like manner environed with a crown bearing fleurs-de-l 8 only; whereas that supposed to represent Robert Bruce, in the Abbey of Dunfermline, where that great deliverer lies buried, bears the crosses also. These circumstances afford strong indications in support of the hypothesis which assigns the date of the present crown to the happy reign of that great monarch. There occurs only one argument affecting this hypothesis; namely, that it is possible the crown used at David's coronation may have been again carried off during the brief usurpation of Edward Baliol in 1332. But although it is certain, that in that year Baliol went through the ceremony of a coronation at Scone, and therefore was in possession of the regalia, yet there is nothing in any of the historians which can lead us to suppose that any dilapidation took place on that occasion. Neither could Baliol, whose ambition it was, under the protection of England, to establish himself as king of Scotland, have had the slightest motive for offering such a gratuitous insult to the A feelings of his subjects. To which it may be added, that his expulsion from Scotland was so sudden and so precipitate, that, far from having time to carry with him any part of the national jewels, Baliol escaped from Annan with scarce a single attendant, and very nearly in a state of nakedness. In the long wars and disturbances which followed, Scotland was indeed repeatedly overrun, but never subjugated; Dumbarton, Dunbar, and other strongholds were usually in possession of the patriots, who had therefore the means of securing the regalia. We cannot suppose that they neglected this; for the silence both of English and Scottish historians, whose exultation or grief would have been sufficiently clamorous, seems to assure us that the crown of Bruce did not again fall into the hands of the enemy. We ought also to mention, that, as far as the rudeness of the coinage enables us to determine, the coins of Scotland, down to the reign of James IV., exhibit a diadem or circle, relieved with fleursde-lis and crosses, exactly resembling the original and more ancient part of the present Scottish crown. In the end of the fifteenth century, the sovereigns of the independent states of Europe began to alter the shape of their crowns, and to close them with arches at the top, in imitation of those which are called imperial. This distinction was formerly proper to emperors. "The crown of the emperor," we translate from Honorius of Augsburg," represents the circle of the globe. Augustus, therefore, bears it in evidence that he possesses the sovereignty of the world. An arch is bended over the diadem, in order to represent the ocean, by which the world is divided."* But although this mystical explanation seems to render the arched crown peculiar to the imperial dignity, the distinction was soon afterwards assumed by the kings of Europe, in order to establish a suitable distinction between independent monarchs and the petty sovereigns of every description, all of whom assumed the diadem, or open crown. Charles VIII. of France took an arched crown in the year 1495. There is some doubt with regard to the time when the close crown was assumed in England, but the best authorities refer it to the reign of Henry VII. and the year 1485. The practice at length became so general, that the French phrase, fermer la couronne, signifies the effort of a prince to shake himself clear of vassalage to a superior. The Scottish monarchs had more reason than most others to maintain in every way their title to that independence, which they had been so often obliged to assert against the encroaching pretensions of their neighbours. Accordingly, on James IV.'s second coinage in the year 1483, he is represented with bushy hair, and a close or arched crown, which, as Snelling remarks, is as early, if not an * Gemma Animæ, lib. i. cap. 224. |