Several houses in the neighbourhood of the Old Bank Close served to
give a respectful notion of the wealth and domestic state of certain
merchants of an early age. Immediately to the westward, in Brodie’s
Close, was the mansion of William Little of Liberton, bearing date
1570. This was an eminent merchant, and the founder of a family now
represented by Mr Little Gilmour of the Inch, in whose possession
this mansion continued under entail, till purchased and taken down
by the Commissioners of Improvements in 1836. About 1780 it was the
residence of the notorious Deacon Brodie, of whom something may be
said elsewhere. Sir William Gray of Pittendrum, mentioned a few pages
back as the original owner of the old house in Lady Stair’s Close, was
another affluent trafficker of that age.
In Riddel’s Close, Lawnmarket, there is an enclosed court, evidently
intended to be capable of defence. It is the place where John
Macmoran, a rich merchant of the time of James VI., lived and carried
on his business. In those days even schoolboys trusted to violence
for attaining their ends. The youths of the High School,[58] being
malcontent about their holidays, barred themselves up in the school
with some provisions, and threatened not to surrender till the
magistrates should comply with their demands. John Macmoran, who held
the office of one of the bailies, came with a _posse_ to deal with the
boys, but, finding them obdurate, ordered the door to be prised open
with a joist. One within then fired a pistol at the bailie, who fell
shot through the brain, to the horror of all beholders, including the
schoolboys themselves, who with difficulty escaped the vengeance of the
crowd assembled on the spot.
It was ascertained that the immediate author of the bailie’s death was
William Sinclair, son of the chancellor of Caithness. There was a great
clamour to have justice done upon him; but this was a point not easily
attained, where a person of gentle blood was concerned, in the reign
of James VI. The boy lived to be Sir William Sinclair of Mey, and, as
such, was the ancestor of those who have, since 1789, borne the title
of Earls of Caithness.
[Illustration: Bailie Macmoran’s House, Riddel’s Court.]
A visit to the fine old mansion of Bailie Macmoran may be recommended.
Its masonry is not without elegance. The lower floor of the building
is now used as ‘The Mechanics’ Library.’[59] Macmoran’s house is in
the floor above, reached by a stone stair, near the corner of the
court. This dwelling offers a fine specimen of the better class of
houses at the end of the sixteenth century. The marble jambs of the
fireplaces and the carved stucco ceilings are quite entire. The larger
room (occupied as a warehouse for articles of saddlery) is that in
which took place two memorable royal banquets in 1598—the first on the
24th of April to James VI. with his queen, Anne of Denmark, and her
brother the Duke of Holstein; and the second on the 2nd of May, more
specially to the Duke of Holstein, but at which their Majesties were
present. These banquets, held, as Birrel says, with ‘grate solemnitie
and mirrines,’ were at the expense of the city. It need hardly be said
that James VI. was fond of this species of entertainment, and the house
of Macmoran was probably selected for the purpose not only because he
was treasurer to the corporation and a man of some mark, but because
his dwelling offered suitable accommodation. The general aspect of the
enclosed court which affords access to Macmoran’s house has undergone
little or no alteration since these memorable banquets; and in visiting
the place, with its quietude and seclusion, one almost feels as if
stepping back into the sixteenth century. Considering the destruction
all around from city improvements, it is fortunate that this remarkable
specimen of an old mansion should have been left so singularly entire.
One of the higher windows continues to exemplify an economical
arrangement which prevailed about the time of the Restoration—namely,
to have the lower half composed of wooden shutters.[60]
The grandest of all these old Edinburgh merchants was William Dick,
ancestor of the Dicks, baronets of Prestonfield. In his youth, and
during the lifetime of his father, he had been able to lend £6000 to
King James, to defray the expense of his journey to Scotland. The
affairs in which he was engaged would even now be considered important.
For example, he farmed the customs on wine at £6222, and the crown
rents of Orkney at £3000. Afterwards he farmed the excise. His fleets
extended from the Baltic to the Mediterranean. The immense wealth he
acquired enabled him to purchase large estates. He himself reckoned his
property as at one time equal to two hundred thousand pounds sterling.
Strange to say, this great merchant came to poverty, and died in a
prison. The reader of the Waverley novels may remember David Deans
telling how his father ‘saw them toom the sacks of dollars out o’
Provost Dick’s window intill the carts that carried them to the army
at Dunse Law’—‘if ye winna believe his testimony, there is the
window itsell still standing in the Luckenbooths—I think it’s a
claith-merchant’s buith the day.’ This refers to large advances which
Dick made to the Covenanters to enable them to carry on the war against
the king. The house alluded to is actually now a claith-merchant’s
booth, having long been in the possession of Messrs John Clapperton &
Company. Two years after Dunse Law, Dick gave the Covenanters 100,000
merks in one sum. Subsequently, being after all of royalist tendencies,
he made still larger advances in favour of the Scottish government
during the time when Charles II. was connected with it; and thus
provoking the wrath of the English Commonwealth, his ruin was completed
by the fines to which he was subjected by that party when triumphant,
amounting in all to £65,000.
Poor Sir William Dick—for he had been made a baronet by Charles
I.—went to London to endeavour to recover some part of his lost means.
When he represented the indigence to which he had been reduced, he was
told that he was always able to procure pie-crust when other men could
not get bread. There was, in fact, a prevalent idea that he possessed
some supernatural means—such as the philosopher’s stone—of acquiring
money. (Pie-crust came to be called _Sir William Dick’s Necessity_.)
The contrary was shown when the unfortunate man died soon after in a
prison in Westminster. There is a picture in Prestonfield House, near
Edinburgh, the seat of his descendant, representing him in this last
retreat in a mean dress, surrounded by his numerous hapless family. A
rare pamphlet, descriptive of his case, presents engravings of three
such pictures; one exhibiting him on horseback, attended by guards
as Lord Provost of Edinburgh, superintending the unloading of one of
his rich ships at Leith; another as a prisoner in the hands of the
bailiffs; the third as dead in prison. A more memorable example of
the instability of fortune does not occur in our history. It seems
completely to realise the picture in Job (chap. xxvii.): ‘The rich man
shall lie down, but he shall not be gathered: he openeth his eyes, and
he is not. Terrors take hold on him as waters, a tempest stealeth him
away in the night. The east wind carrieth him away, and he departeth:
and as a storm, hurleth him out of his place. For God shall cast upon
him, and not spare: he would fain flee out of his hand. Men shall clap
their hands at him, and shall hiss him out of his place.’
The fortunes of the family were restored by Sir William’s grandson,
Sir James, a remarkably shrewd man, who was likewise a merchant
in Edinburgh. There is a traditionary story that this gentleman,
observing the utility of manure, and that the streets of Edinburgh were
loaded with it, to the detriment of the comfort of the inhabitants,
offered to relieve the town of this nuisance on condition that he
should be allowed, for a certain term of years, to carry it away
gratis. Consent was given, and the Prestonfield estate became, in
consequence, like a garden. The Duke of York had a great affection for
Sir James Dick, and used to walk through the Park to visit him at his
house very frequently. Hence, according to the report of the family,
the way his Royal Highness took came to be called _The Duke’s Walk_;
afterwards a famous resort for the fighting of duels. Sir James became
Catholic, and, while provost in 1681, had his house burned over his
head by the collegianers; but it was rebuilt at the public expense.
His grandson, Sir Alexander Dick, is referred to in kindly terms in
Boswell’s _Tour to the Hebrides_ as a venerable man of studious habits
and a friend of men of letters. The reader will probably learn with
some surprise that though Sir William’s descendants never recovered any
of the money lent by him to the State, a lady of his family, living in
1844, was in the enjoyment of a pension with express reference to that
ancient claim.