It is also built in stories. The first consists of a noble groined vault, open on four sides and flanked by large, richly decorated, and pinnacled turrets. Beneath this arch is a statue nine feet high, cut from a single huge block of Carrara marble by John Steell, and representing Sir Walter Scott, seated on a rock, and wrapped in a shepherd's plaid, holding book and pen, and attended by "Maida” lying at his feet. The second story has also a groined vault, enclosed however, and forming a small but lofty room, lighted by a tall window, filled with brilliant, colored glass, in each of its four sides. That to the north bears the figure of St. Andrew; that opposite to it, St. Giles; that to the east the arms of Scotland, with their motto, "Nemo me impune lacessit;" and that to the west, the arms of Edinburgh, inscribed "Nisi Dominus frustra." In this room relics of the poet may be kept. Around the exterior of the second story, and of that above it, are galleries from which view can be had of the elaborate sculpture with which the monument is enriched, and, especially from the upper, of the city and its vicinity. Fifty-six niches are said to be provided for statues, about a dozen of which latter are in position. Among them are "Prince Charlie," "The Lady of the Lake," "Dandie Dinmont," "Meg Merrilies," and "Dominie Sampson" (who is looking upon the railway beneath him, and evidently about to exclaim, according to his custom,— "pro-di-gi-ous!"). Meg Dods" of "St. Ronan's," and "Mause Headrig" ("Old Mortality"), also appear. In the architectural sculpture are portraits of Scottish personages distinguished in literature or history. The material, it is gratifying to observe, retains, thus far, a smooth, hard surface (with slight exception), and indicates durability. Thus pre-eminent, in the very centre of his "own romantic town," enduring and majestic, stands this incomparable cross, a worthy shrine of the Wizard of the North, whose kind and chivalrous spirit seems enthroned within it, watching the places that knew him so well, and warming the hearts and cheering the memories of generations as they come after him. 66 The many local guides or guide-books will direct travellers, with more or less care, to the manifold objects of interest within or around Edinburgh. The number of its attractions and remarkables is too great to be even enumerated here, and to these authorities named explorers must be referred. Places or objects associated with Scott may, however, be, at least, mentioned here; and they are many. If travellers make but one excursion in the environs of the town, it should be to Salisbury Crags and Arthur's Seat, already described, and again mentioned in the next chapter in the story Scott has associated with them. This excursion should also include the whole of the Queen's Drive, an excellent road, two or three miles long, encircling these heights, and commanding views of such unusual variety as to render it one of the most remarkable of all suburban drives. At its entrance from the lower end of the Old Town is perhaps the widest-known structure in Scotland, the combined abbey and palace of Holyrood. Many persons who have not visited that country, know, indeed, its aspect, a quadrangle with a court-yard having three sides composed of high and rather modern buildings, and a fourth side formed by a lower screen, uniting two large, ancient, square towers, with pointed-roofed turrets at their angles. On the north side of the palace is the gray or blackened, decaying abbey. On the main floor of the northern side of the palace is the great gallery described in “Waverley," page 145. In the large square tower in front of the gallery are the well-known apartments once occupied by Mary, Queen of Scots, - an audience chamber, bedroom, dressing-room, and supper-room. In the last -small, narrow, and rude - Rizzio was attacked. In these older portions of Holyrood we may imagine the scenes of "Marmion' (page 44), and of Roland Græme's interview with the Regent Murray, or other scenes of “The Abbot” (page 247). From Holyrood, the Canongate - associated with sundry famous, if fabulous, "Chronicles "— leads to the recesses of the Old Town. Among these are many of the localities associated with Scott's chief story of Edinburgh, "The Heart of Mid-Lothian," that will be sketched in the next chapter. Among these recesses also, in "Lady Stair's Close," is the original house of Lady Forester of "My Aunt Margaret's Mirror" (chapter xlix). In more open area is the princely Jacobean "Heriot's Hospital," nobly suggesting its founder, "Jingling Geordie," portrayed in "The Fortunes of Nigel" (chapter xliii). At the Castle, that is monumental record of many stirring chapters of Scottish history, are, also, not a few associations with Sir Walter Scott. In the vicinity of Edinburgh many excursions may be made to portions of his Lands. Along the sea-coast may be visited North Berwick, the Bass Rock, and Tantallon (described in " Marmion," page 46), and Preston Pans ("Waverley," page 145). South-east is Crichton Castle (" Marmion," page 43); Carberry Hill (pages 249 and 258); and Dalkeith and Lasswade (chapter iv.), from which the way of travellers should be to Drummond's Hawthornden, and Roslin Glen and Castle and Chapel (page 17). Westward, seventeen miles, is Linlithgow with its palace, "excelling" all other Scottish "royal dwellings," a story of which is told in "Marmion.” On the way thither may be seen Niddrie (page 253), where Queen Mary rested during the night after her escape from Loch-Leven Castle. Nearer town, and in this direction, are Ravelston and Craigcrook, interesting old mansions, mentioned on page 141, supposed prototypes of Tully-Veolan in "Waverley." Another original of the same residence, in this vicinity, is Traquair House, Peebles-shire, described in chapter xxxi. Routes for the tour southward from Edinburgh are mentioned at the close of the next chapter. XXX. "THE HEART OF MID-LOTHIAN." Seventh Novel of the Series, written 1817-18; Published June, 1818; ALTHOUGH many incidents of this eventful and pathetic story are represented to have occurred in many widely scattered places, yet Edinburgh, as the title suggests, is the locality with which it is chiefly associated; indeed, it is peculiarly Scott's story of his "own romantic town." In order to visit the scene or the site of the earlier portion of its action, one should go to the upper part of the High Street. This, among the remarkable streets of Europe, is moderately wide, and marks the crest-line of the ridge on which stands the Old Town. It leads from the Canongate and a great deal of squalor, through general comfort, or even neatness and grim picturesqueness, to the Castle. Towards the latter, and on the south side of the street, is the church of St. Giles, originally cruciform, and a good example of early pointed, and now, although altered, an interesting building. It has a conspicuous tower (one hundred and sixty feet high), crowned by pinnacles and a small spire borne by flying buttresses. Close to this church, a little in front of it, and encroaching upon the street, stood a massive, turreted, five-storied stone structure of various ages, in which Queen Mary and others held parliaments and justiciary courts. At a later period the structure served for a prison, once under name of the Old Tolbooth, but since, and probably for coming time, distinguished as the "Heart of Mid-Lothian." It was demolished in 1817, after the new castellated prison was built on Calton Hill. The entrance door and the huge padlock and key were removed to Abbotsford, where they now appear among the many curiosities collected by Scott. During Tuesday night, Sept. 7, 1736, the main action of the story commenced at and near this Tolbooth, in an exciting affair that had more than local celebrity. Captain John Porteous, of the City Guard (a sort of police), had been pettily insulted while, shortly before, conducting the execution of two men for what, at that period of the union of Scotland with England, was popularly felt the very excusable offence of smuggling. In his provoked temper, he obliged the troops under his orders to fire upon an assembled crowd, and thus several persons were killed or wounded. For this conduct he was tried and condemned to death, but received reprieve, to the great disgust of the populace. The effect of the reprieve became evident upon the night mentioned, when a powerful mob, under remarkable organization, took him from the Tolbooth and executed him, by hanging, as it was thought he ought to be executed. Two persons beside Porteous appeared rather prominent in this lynching affair. One was a very active leader of the rioters, a young man, disguised as a woman and called Wildfire. The other was also a young man, but of very different character, Reuben Butler, a Church probationer, seized by the mob to perform the last rites of religion over the doomed captain. There was yet another person prominent in the story, but scarcely more than introduced at this time,- Effie Deans, younger daughter of Davie Deans, a cow-feeder of St. Leonards (near the Queen's Park). She was then confined in the Tolbooth, awaiting trial for murder of her own infant child. These three persons, so differing, and apparently separated, unite with one of Scott's most admirable characters, Jeanie Deans, the simple, heroic, true-hearted sister of Effie, to develop this story. This was founded on a narration that was communicated to the author by a friend, and that related to the history of Helen Walker, who, in 1786, was, according to Mr. Chambers, "a little, stoutlooking woman, between seventy and eighty years of age," living "by the humblest means of subsistence," in the neighborhood of Dumfries. In early life she had "charge of a younger sister named Tibby (Isabella), whom she endeavored to maintain and educate by her own exertions." Sorely to her surprise, this sister was arrested and held for trial on a charge of child-murder, and she herself was summoned principal witness against her. "The counsel for the prisoner told Helen that, if she could declare that her sister had made any preparation, however slight," or had given her any intimation on the subject, that "such a statement would save her sister's life," as she was the principal witness against her. Helen said, “It is impossible for me to swear to a falsehood; and, whatever may be the consequence, I will give my oath according to my conscience." "Isabella was found guilty and condemned; and, in removing her from the bar, she was heard to say to her sister, 'O Nelly! ye've been the cause of my death!'" In Scotland, however, "six weeks must elapse between the sentence and the execution." Before a day had passed, Helen, with a suitable document, was on her way on foot to London. In her country tartan, she there presented herself to John, Duke of Argyle, "who immediately procured the pardon she petitioned for, and Helen returned with it on foot, just in time to save her sister." Isabella afterwards married the father of her child. Helen Walker, the original of Jeanie Deans, “died in the spring of 1791,” and was buried in the churchyard of Irongrey, near Dumfries. No stone marked her grave until 1831, when Scott himself caused a modest monument to be erected to her, and inscribed with a beautiful epitaph, his own composition. An interesting account of the Porteous mob, and of persons in some manner connected with it, introduces the main story of "The Heart of Mid-Lothian;" and to see the scenes associated with this, one had best go from the High Street, down the Canongate, to the Queen's Drive, and ascend the path winding around the Salisbury Crags. "If," wrote Scott, in the eighth chapter of this novel, "I were to choose a spot from which the rising or setting sun could be seen to the greatest possible advantage, it would be that wild path wind |