Finding nothing to detain us at Bamff, we set out in the morning, and
having breakfasted at Cullen, about noon came to Elgin, where in the inn,
that we supposed the best, a dinner was set before us, which we could not
eat. This was the first time, and except one, the last, that I found any
reason to complain of a Scotish table; and such disappointments, I
suppose, must be expected in every country, where there is no great
frequency of travellers.
The ruins of the cathedral of Elgin afforded us another proof of the
waste of reformation. There is enough yet remaining to shew, that it was
once magnificent. Its whole plot is easily traced. On the north side of
the choir, the chapter-house, which is roofed with an arch of stone,
remains entire; and on the south side, another mass of building, which we
could not enter, is preserved by the care of the family of Gordon; but
the body of the church is a mass of fragments.
A paper was here put into our hands, which deduced from sufficient
authorities the history of this venerable ruin. The church of Elgin had,
in the intestine tumults of the barbarous ages, been laid waste by the
irruption of a highland chief, whom the bishop had offended; but it was
gradually restored to the state, of which the traces may be now
discerned, and was at last not destroyed by the tumultuous violence of
Knox, but more shamefully suffered to dilapidate by deliberate robbery
and frigid indifference. There is still extant, in the books of the
council, an order, of which I cannot remember the date, but which was
doubtless issued after the Reformation, directing that the lead, which
covers the two cathedrals of Elgin and Aberdeen, shall be taken away, and
converted into money for the support of the army. A Scotch army was in
those times very cheaply kept; yet the lead of two churches must have
born so small a proportion to any military expence, that it is hard not
to believe the reason alleged to be merely popular, and the money
intended for some private purse. The order however was obeyed; the two
churches were stripped, and the lead was shipped to be sold in Holland. I
hope every reader will rejoice that this cargo of sacrilege was lost at
sea.
Let us not however make too much haste to despise our neighbours. Our
own cathedrals are mouldering by unregarded dilapidation. It seems to be
part of the despicable philosophy of the time to despise monuments of
sacred magnificence, and we are in danger of doing that deliberately,
which the Scots did not do but in the unsettled state of an imperfect
constitution.
Those who had once uncovered the cathedrals never wished to cover them
again; and being thus made useless, they were, first neglected, and
perhaps, as the stone was wanted, afterwards demolished.
Elgin seems a place of little trade, and thinly inhabited. The episcopal
cities of Scotland, I believe, generally fell with their churches, though
some of them have since recovered by a situation convenient for commerce.
Thus Glasgow, though it has no longer an archbishop, has risen beyond its
original state by the opulence of its traders; and Aberdeen, though its
ancient stock had decayed, flourishes by a new shoot in another place.
In the chief street of Elgin, the houses jut over the lowest story, like
the old buildings of timber in London, but with greater prominence; so
that there is sometimes a walk for a considerable length under a
cloister, or portico, which is now indeed frequently broken, because the
new houses have another form, but seems to have been uniformly continued
in the old city.