Corstorphine--The Cat-Stane--Gogar--Hatton--Saughton
Hall--Dalry.
Our walk to-day takes us in an entirely different direction, and to
fields as yet unexplored. With our faces to the setting sun, we leave
Edinburgh by the great west road, which for the first few miles is
so cramped and hemmed in by modern houses that all recollections of
the past are effaced. By degrees, as we pass Murrayfield, the villas
grow fewer, the gardens and parks which lie on the hill slopes to
our right get larger, but there is a sadly short interval of green
fields and hedgerows, before we enter the rapidly growing village of
Corstorphine, which threatens soon to lose its identity, and become a
mere suburb of Edinburgh. How changed since the day when
On Ravelston cliffs, and on Clermiston Lee
Died away the wild war-notes of bonnie Dundee.
Clermiston Lee still rises steep and bare behind the village, but the
old castle of the Foresters, which then stood below it, has vanished;
only a few stones remaining to show where it once was. Gone, too,
is their town house in Forester's Wynd,--gone is their very name!
The proud and ancient title of Lord Forester of Corstorphine has
passed by inheritance to an English earl, and is merged in the higher
honours of Verulam. The tombs alone of the old knights remain in the
beautiful church, which, altered and mutilated as it is, still bears
traces of its past glory.
The first Forester who possessed Corstorphine was Sir Adam. He was
a gallant knight, who fought by the side of the Douglas at Homildon
Hill, and fell a captive into Hotspur's hands. He was ransomed, but
three years later (1405) he died at Corstorphine, full of years and
honours. His son, Sir John, was Great Chamberlain of Scotland, and
Master of the Household to James I. In his time the church was built
(1444), and erected into a collegiate foundation, with a provost,
four prebendaries, and two singing boys. It has been conjectured that
one of the first provosts was the "Gentill Rowll," whom Dunbar, in
his beautiful "Lament of the Makaris," bemoans as one of those whom
Death "has tane out of this countrie."
He has tane Rowll of Abirdeen
And gentill Rowll of Corstorphyne;
Twa bettir fallowis did no man sie,
_Timor mortis conturbat me_.
His name is embalmed with those of other poets of his day, Chaucer,
Wyntoun, Blind Harry, Barbour; but it is doubtful if a line of his
writings has come down to us.[52] When we enter the old church where
he officiated, we shall be sadly disappointed. The requirements of
a Presbyterian place of worship have altered it so much from its
original form, that we must shut our eyes, and throw our minds back
into former days, before we can picture it, or even understand it at
all. What is now the porch was then the chancel, but the altar-tombs
have been spared, with their recumbent effigies.
[52] There is a poem in the Bannatyne MS. termed "Rowll's Cursing."
Whether written by him, or only in his name, is not known. "The
following passage in it," writes the learned Lord Hailes, "determines
the era at which he lived:--
----and now of Rome that beiris the rod,
Undir the hevin to lowse and bind,
Paip Alexander.
The Pontiff here meant must have been the virtuous Alexander VI.,
who was _Divine Vicegerent_, from 1492 to 1503." In _Select Remains
of the Ancient Popular Poetry of Scotland_, printed by Dr. Laing in
1822, the poem is given, and entitled
The cursing of Sir John Rowlis
Upoun the steilars of his fowlis;
but to which of the two Rowlls this refers is unknown.
"Two of the altar-tombs," to quote Wilson's vivid description,
"occupy arched recesses in the chancel, one of them being the
monument of Sir John Forester, the founder of the collegiate church,
and his lady, apparently a St. Clair of Orkney, judging from the arms
impaled with the Foresters' on one of the sculptured shields. The
knight and lady are in armour and dress of the fifteenth century,
and the latter clasps her breviary in her hands. In the other
monument, supposed to represent the son of the founder and his wife,
the lady's hands are meekly crossed over her breast. The supposed
Crusader lies apart on his altar-tomb in the south transept, with his
dog at his feet. He is traditionally affirmed to be Bernard, Lord of
Aubigny, who died at the castle of Corstorphine, while on an embassy
to the court of James IV. in 1508; but the monument is of older
date, and the shield bears the Foresters' own heraldic hunting horns
stringed."[53] One shield impaled with Forester bears the _fesse
cheque_ of Stuart,--perhaps for Marion Stewart, Lady Dalswinton, wife
of the second Sir John Forester.
[53] Wilson's _Reminiscences of Old Edinburgh_.
[Illustration: _Tomb in Corstorphine Church_.]
The church is built in the form of a cross, and part of the roof is
still covered with the old grey flagstones. A small square belfry
tower at the west end is surmounted by a short octagonal spire, with
richly ornamented string mouldings. In the pre-Reformation days,
the provostry of Corstorphine was a lucrative and much sought after
office. In the beginning of the sixteenth century it was held by the
Robert Cairncross who bears an unenviable reputation in Buchanan's
history, by the manner in which he obtained the Abbey of Holyrood,
without subjecting himself to the law against simony. Having
ascertained that the abbot was at the point of death, he wagered a
considerable sum with the king that he would _not_ be offered the
first vacant benefice, and lost his bet by being appointed Abbot of
Holyrood.
Putting on one side such wild legends as derive the name of
Corstorphine from _Croix d'or fin_, the golden cross presented to the
church by some mythical French noble, it seems far more probable that
the village was called after the "Cross of Torphin;" though of that
there are now no traces left. Probably it was erected by the same
Torphin who gave his name to one of the outlying spurs of Pentland,
which is still called Torphin Hill, and stands in Colinton parish.
Tradition says he was an archdeacon of Lothian, but his name carries
one back to the early Saxon invaders of the land. In old days a loch
stretched over what now is fertile plain; and the Water of Leith,
which ran out of it, was deep enough for the Lords Forrester to
bring their provisions up from Edinburgh by boat to their castle of
Corstorphine, which stood close to the north-west corner of the loch.
At this castle a terrible crime was committed in August 1679. George,
the first Lord Forester, had no son, and, to prevent the extinction
of the family name, he resigned his honours into Charles II.'s hands,
and obtained a fresh patent in favour of his daughter Jean and her
husband, James Baillie of Torwoodhead, who accordingly succeeded
as second Lord Forester. This nobleman's first wife had died
childless, it is said, heart-broken at the neglect and indignities
she suffered at his hands. He was a second time a widower,--having
married a daughter of the old Cavalier general, Patrick Ruthven,
Earl of Forth and Brentford, by whom he had five children, all of
whom bore their mother's name of Ruthven,--when popular rumour
accused him of carrying on an intrigue with the beautiful Christian
Nimmo,[54] the wife of a merchant in Edinburgh. She was a great deal
younger than himself, and a niece of his first wife's. This near
relationship greatly increased the scandal, which was aggravated by
Lord Forester having always professed to be a religious man, and a
rigid Presbyterian. Mrs. Nimmo, besides being a very beautiful woman,
was of a violent and impulsive nature. She was believed always to
carry a sword under her petticoats,[55] and so was not a person to
be treated lightly, especially by those who reflected what blood ran
in her veins,--a Mrs. Bedford, who had murdered her husband a few
years before, being her cousin-german. She was also related to the
unhappy Lady Warriston, who suffered death for the same crime in
1600. Lord Forester's passion for her appears to have cooled; and,
shutting his eyes to possible consequences, he permitted himself in
one of his carouses to speak more than lightly of her. This came to
her ears, and, seized with fury, she went at once to his castle at
Corstorphine. He was absent when she arrived, drinking at a tavern in
the village. She sent for him, and met him in the garden, close to
the old dovecot, where a violent altercation took place between them.
In the midst of it, she snatched the sword from his side, ran him
through the body, and killed him.
[54] She was Christian Hamilton, daughter of Grange Hamilton, and
maternal grand-daughter of the first Lord Forester.
[55] Kirkton's _History of the Church of Scotland_, edited with notes
by Charles Kirkpatrick Sharpe, page 184.
"The inhabitants of the village," writes Charles Sharpe, "still
relate some circumstances of the murder, not recorded by
Fountainhall. Mrs. Nimmo, attended by her maid, had gone from
Edinburgh to the castle of Corstorphine." After the murder, "she
took refuge in a garret of the castle, but was discovered by one of
her slippers, which dropped through a crevice in the floor. It need
hardly be added that, till lately, the inhabitants of the village
were greatly annoyed, of a moonlight night, by the appearance of a
woman clothed in white, with a bloody sword in her hand, wandering
and waiting near the pigeon-house." She was seized and brought
before the sheriff in Edinburgh. She confessed her crime, but
pleaded that Lord Forester, being ferocious and intoxicated with
drink, had drawn his sword; that, to save herself, she had snatched
it from him, and that in the struggle he had fallen upon it, and
so killed himself. In spite of this defence, sentence of death was
passed upon her, which she contrived to have postponed for two
months, under a false pretext of her condition. During this interval
she escaped one evening from the Tolbooth, disguised as a man, but
she was recaptured next day at Fala Mill, and beheaded at the Market
Cross on the 12th November 1679. At her execution she appeared
dressed in deep mourning, with a long veil, which, before laying her
head on the block, she took off, and replaced with a white taffeta
hood. She met her fate with great courage.[56] It was said at the
time that, in spite of his professed Presbyterianism, a dispensation
from the Pope to marry Mrs. Nimmo was found among Lord Forester's
papers, and that his delay in using it had caused her fury.
[56] Fountainhall's _Historical Notices_, vol. i. p. 231-233.
By the terms of the patent, the barony and lands of Corstorphine
passed to Lord Forester's nephew, William Baillie, his mother having
been Lilias, youngest daughter of the first baron. He became third
Lord Forester, and in his line the title has since remained.
The fertile pastures that surround Corstorphine provided our
forefathers with that favourite delicacy, known as Corstorphine
cream. It was a variety of the old Scottish dish called "Hattit Kit,"
and much resembled it.[57]
[57] This preparation of milk is very ancient, and probably
originated among the Tartars, by whom it was made of mares' milk, and
called _Koumiss_. It is believed to have been introduced into this
country by the wandering Eastern tribes, who, leaving their native
Phœnicia, gradually spread themselves along the north of Africa,
and, leaving traces of their passage in the Basque Provinces and
Brittany, colonised first Cornwall, and then the western coast of
this island; and a few of whose customs still linger among us. There
is a very interesting dissertation on this subject in _The Pillars of
Hercules_, by the late David Urquhart, M. P.
About a quarter of a mile to the west of Corstorphine, the high road
divides in two,--the branch to the right making its way by Linlithgow
to the north; the other leading straight on, and reaching Glasgow
eventually. Though it is out of the direction of this walk, and we
shall have to retrace our steps to this point, we would pray our
kind companions to go with us as far along the first-named road as
the bridge which crosses the Almond near Kirkliston, and joins the
counties of West and Midlothian. It is not more than a mile and
a half off, and, just before reaching it, we turn aside, along a
rough cart track leading into a field. This field lies in the angle
between the Almond and the impetuous little Gogar Burn, which we have
crossed without noticing; and about the centre, on slightly rising
ground, stands the object of our search--the end of our pilgrimage.
To you it is but a rude, shapeless block of stone, too stunted and
lumpy to have any appearance of dignity, and not more venerable or
ancient-looking than any other time-worn, moss-grown fragment. But
to us who know, it is eloquent with a thousand voices! This is the
Cat-Stane, the most northerly monument of that intruding race by
which Pict and Gael alike were driven back to their native hills.
Beneath this massive stone has slept for centuries the grandfather
of Hengist and Horsa. "In oc tumulo jacit Vetta f. Victi." So its
mutilated inscription was read years ago by the learned Edward
Lhwyd,--and so does its latest interpreter, Sir James Simpson, read
it also.
[Illustration: _The Cat-stane_.]
The Venerable Bede, in describing the invasion of England by the
German tribes in the time of Vortigern, states that their "leaders
were two brothers, Hengist and Horsa, who were the sons of Victgils,
whose father was Vetta, whose father was Victa, whose father was
Woden." So the genealogy runs, and in this all the old chroniclers
are agreed; and here undoubtedly lies a Vetta, the son of Victa,
neither of them common names among the Saxons. We may ask ourselves
what brought the Saxon chief so far from his native shores, and to
a land where his race did not take root? But we have the authority
of Nennius for saying that the Saxons occupied for a short period
various regions beyond the _Mare Frisicum_ (the Firth of Forth),
and Ammianus Marcellinus tells us that, two generations before the
invasion of Hengist and Horsa, a Saxon host was leagued with the
other races of Scotland, the Picts, Scots, and Attacots, against
their common enemy, the Romans, and fought with a Roman army under
Theodosius. The battle probably took place near this spot, for it
must have been fought somewhere between the two Roman walls, and this
place is included in that tract of country. The vulgar name of the
monument, the Cat-Stane, points to this hypothesis, the name being
clearly derived from the British _Cad_, the Scoto-Irish _Cath_, the
Welsh _Cat_, all meaning "battle."[58] When Mr. Lhwyd visited the
spot in 1688, the sculptured stone was surrounded by large stones
laid lengthways, this one only being set on end.
[58] Should any one wish to pursue this subject further, he will find
it most exhaustively treated in vol. I. of _Archæological Essays_, by
the late Sir James Young Simpson, Baronet. May not possibly Torphin,
who gave his name to the neighbouring village of Corstorphine, have
been a leader in the same Saxon host?
Beside this venerable monument, how modern appears everything else
that we have looked at! What changes it has seen! And yet here it
stands, little altered by the centuries that have passed over it. One
deed of violence it was a witness of, which we must not forget to
mention. On this very spot, in April 1567, Queen Mary was seized, on
her way from Stirling to Edinburgh, by a troop consisting of eight
hundred spears, commanded by Lord Bothwell. They surrounded her
attendants, and, taking possession by force of the Queen's person,
hurried her off on the fatal journey to Dunbar.
Returning now to the point where we left the Glasgow road, we pursue
it for a mile, and then see on our right some beautiful hammered-iron
gates. These are the lost gates of Caroline Park, whose forsaken
gate pillars we shall see to-morrow. They now defend the entrance
to Gogar House, a curious old mansion with winding stairs, which
stands in a sheltered position near the Gogar Burn. It was once a
much more important place. It possessed two villages, Nether Gogar
and Gogar Stone. One has disappeared, the other dwindled down to a
few houses. It had a church whose priest was one of the prebendaries
of Corstorphine. Only a small portion is still extant, and that is
used as a burial ground. In the 14th century Gogar was given by
King Robert Bruce to his faithful companion, Sir Alexander Seton. He
was one of those who signed the famous letter to the Pope in 1330,
asserting the independence of their country, and vowing that, so
long as a hundred of them remained alive, they would never submit to
the king of England.[59] After him Gogar belonged to many different
families, including the Logans of Restalrig, and the Erskines, a
younger branch of Mar. At the end of the last century it was bought
by the Ramsays of Barnton.
[59] The original document, with signatures and seals attached, is
preserved in the Register House, Edinburgh.
We now turn to the left and pass Millburn Tower and Gogar Station,
and then, crossing the Union Canal, we finally emerge on the other
great west road that leaves Edinburgh and runs past Dalmahoy to
Midcalder. Dalmahoy, and even Riccarton (of which we see the woods
to the west of us), are too far out of the range of our walks to
explore; but, though Hatton is even farther off, we must make a
passing allusion to that curious old place. It is almost the only
house left in this part of Scotland which preserves untouched the
characteristics of the time when it was built, the latter half of
the 17th century. Part of the house is the original tower of the
Lauders of Haltoun,[60] and dates from the 14th century, but it was
completely altered and remodelled, when Charles Maitland, afterwards
fourth Earl of Lauderdale (who married the heiress) built the
present house. It stands back in a flagged court, closed by iron
gates. On the garden side the ground falls rapidly away, so that a
terraced wall bounds the courtyard on this side, and is supported
at the corners by curious old-fashioned pavilions with steep roofs,
and doors opening into the garden below. Everywhere may be seen
the coronets and crossed L's of the Lauderdales, who made this one
of their principal seats, till it was sold in 1792 by the eighth
earl. He was my great-grandfather; and a curious story is handed
down of his father's residence at Hatton. That Lord Lauderdale kept
a pack of harriers with which he was very fond of hunting. Time
after time these hounds put up a very large hare in the park, which,
after a good run, invariably succeeded in eluding them, and always
disappeared near a cottage, inhabited by a solitary old woman,
popularly believed to be a witch. His huntsman told him that hare
would never be caught, as he was sure it was the witch herself, but
Lord Lauderdale would not believe him. At last, one day, just as the
hare was making off as usual, the leading hound got near enough, and
seized it by the leg; but, not having sufficient hold, the hare got
away and disappeared in the cottage. Lord Lauderdale, who was close
up, jumped off his horse and went into the cottage, where he found
no hare, but only the old woman sitting by the fire, groaning and
rubbing her leg. She had been quite well that morning, but made some
excuse to Lord Lauderdale about having hurt herself. He knew better,
and so did every one else.
[60] The arms of Lauder of Haltoun were--argent, a griffon salient
sable, beaked and membered gules.
When Lord Lauderdale sold Hatton, it was bought by the Davidsons of
Muirhouse, who cut down the beautiful lime avenue of great length,
which formerly led up to the house. In their turn, they sold it to
the present Lord Morton, then Lord Aberdour, in 1872.
After this digression, we return to our walk, and continue our way
towards Edinburgh. It is a flat, uninteresting, highly cultivated
country through which we are passing. Away to our right, but quite
out of sight, is the deep valley of the Water of Leith, which runs
past Currie and Colinton. Near it stands the curious old house of
Baberton, where Charles X. resided for a short time, when, after
the Revolution of 1830, he found a refuge in Scotland. Just before
reaching Saughton, we cross the Water of Leith, which is permanently
spoilt and discoloured by the mills farther up. The beautiful old
bridge lies a hundred yards to the left, and to reach Saughton
Hall we have to cross it. It has three arches supported by massive
piers, and on a square panel is the date 1670, when it was probably
repaired. It is of great age.
Saughton Hall is the old seat of the Bairds of Saughton, now
represented by Sir James Gardiner Baird, whose grandfather let it,
early in this century, to the proprietors of a private lunatic
asylum. To fit it for their use, it has been so added to, and the
place so altered, that little of its original form remains.
We next pass the little village of Gorgie, with its tan works, and
find ourselves in the outskirts of Edinburgh. The suburb by which we
enter the town is called Dalry, a name of Celtic origin, from _dal_,
a vale, and _righ_, the king. The earliest mention of this property
is in the time of Robert I., who granted a charter of the lands of
Dalry to William Bisset. The Bissets were a powerful and important
family in those days. In the 16th century, Dalry became the property
of the Chiesly family, wealthy burgesses of Edinburgh.
[Illustration: _Saughton Bridge_.]
On Easter Sunday, March 31, 1689, the Lord President, Sir George
Lockhart of Carnwath, was shot dead by John Chiesly of Dalry. The
motives for this dreadful deed were those of private ill-feeling.
Chiesly, who was on bad terms with his wife, swore to be revenged on
the Lord President for assigning to her a small aliment (only £93 a
year) out of his estates. He was a man of violent and ungovernable
passions. Six months before the murder, he told Sir James Stewart in
London that he was "determined to go to Scotland before Candlemas,
and kill the President." "The very imagination of such a thing," said
Sir James, "is a sin before God." "Leave God and me alone," was the
fierce answer; "we have many things to reckon betwixt us, and we will
reckon this too!" The Lord President was warned of these threats,
but took no notice. Chiesly dogged him home from church that Easter
Sunday, and shot him in the back as he went into his own house,
in the Old Bank Close. Lady Lockhart was confined to her bed with
illness, but, on hearing the pistol-shot, she sprang up and rushed
forward in her night-dress, just in time to see her husband carried
in, and laid on two chairs, where he instantly expired. Chiesly,
being caught red-handed, was sentenced to death next day by the Lord
Provost. He was dragged on a hurdle to the Cross, where his right
hand was struck off while still alive. Then he was hanged in chains
at the Gallowlee, and his right hand was nailed on the West Port.
It was said that his relations and servants came at dead of night
and carried off his body, and buried it near his house of Dalry,
which for long after was alleged to be haunted. It is a curious fact
"that on repairing the garden-wall at a later period," says Wilson,
"an old stone seat, which stood in a recess of the wall, had to be
removed, and underneath was found a skeleton entire, except the bones
of the right hand--without doubt the remains of the assassin, that
had secretly been brought hither from the Gallowlee."
His daughter Rachel married the Honourable James Erskine, Lord
Grange, and was the unhappy Lady Grange, whose story is well known.
After twenty years of quarrels and unhappiness, her husband had her
secretly conveyed to the Hebrides, where, first in one island, then
in another, she lingered out in captivity and solitude the remaining
seventeen years of her most wretched life. Lord Grange was involved
in Jacobite plots, and it is believed that his wife's threat of
betraying him to the Government was what finally decided him in
shutting her up where she could not hurt him.
The old house of the Chieslys still exists. It is a curious old
place with small projecting towers crowned with ogee roofs; but it
is almost concealed among the humbler tenements which thickly cover
that part of the estate, and is now a training school for Scottish
Episcopalian teachers. From the Chieslys, Dalry passed to Sir
Alexander Brand, who owned the neighbouring property of Brandfield
in the district of Fountainbridge. His house there has quite
disappeared, but its name is preserved in Brandfield Place, which is
built on its site. In later times Dalry belonged to the Kirkpatricks
of Allisland, and then to the Walkers, in whose possession it is now.