THE LIBRARY
OF
THE
UNIVERSITY CALIFORNIA LOS ANGELES
OF
THE LATE MB R. M'D. STIRLING, MUBSELBUBGH.-^ Yesterday morning, Mr R. M'D. Stirling, an eminent and much respected Musselburgh gentle- man, died in his sleep in the house of a niece in Edinburgh, where he had been on a short visit. He was in his 78th y«ar, and had been in failing health owing to a bronchial affection for some years back, but the near approach of his end was not apprehended, and the news of his death caused a display of sympathetic interest in Musselburgh during the day. Mr Stirling was a man of un- flagging energy displayed in a great variety of channels. In business he was a partner of the firm of Stirling Brothers, grocers and wine mer- chants, and only retired from trade a few years ago. .In public affairs he took an active part, having served on Musselburgh Town Council, Inveresk Parochial Board, and Inyeresk Parish Council. An enthusiastic Volunteer in his younger days, he commanded for a time the Musselburgh Rifle Company. Among the youth of the town, particularly at the " halflrn " stage, he did good work, not only as conductor of Bible classes and the like, but in carrying on after business hours in his own premises evening classes in commercial subjects. He was an elder and session clerk oi the important Parish Kirk of Inveresk, posts which he held for some forty years till his death. Anti- quarian and local historical research constitute* his chief hobby, however, and on these subjects^he wrote much. His essays were models of pains- taking accuracy, and their literary merit was con- siderable. In 1894 he published his principa work — namely, " Inveresk Parish Lore from Pagan Times" — and this, a goodly-sized volume, has attained a high degree of popularity. It was to him a labour of love in historical subjects to un ravel tangled skeins of fact and fiction, and _a often as not he had such work on hand whicl had been given him to do by friends who hac neither time nor skill to do it for themselves. He was acknowledged and popularly known as the historian of Musselburgh, and his marvellously re tentive memory was ever at the disposal of hi friends. Withal he was of a kindly and courteou disposition after the old echooL He was a bachelor.
THE AUTHOR.
IJNTVERESK
PARIS H L OR E
PAGAN
R M'D. STIRLING.
~]
-
f
»
INVERESK
PARISH LORE
FUOM
PAGAN TIMES.
BY
R. M'D. STIRLING.
MUSSELBURGH: PRINTED BY T. C. BLAIR.
1894.
DA
YE BUKE
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0 PAROCHE AND KYRK <r
OF
INNER ASK,
OEDICAT TO
YE PAROCHINARIS.
719652
INTRODUCTION.
THE story of bygone times in small communities affords an admirable insight into the manners, customs, and social condition of the Scottish people.
A study of these old-world ways as they existed at Inveresk has yielded much delight to the author, and in response to frequent invitations he now offers some of the fruit he has gathered as a contribution to local history, not without hope that others may find in it some of the interest and pleasure he has experienced. Access to Parish and Burgh Records has enabled him to embody many facts never before published, and an endeavour has been made to convey an idea of how valuable these Records are.
In the compilation of the present work numerous and scarce publications in the Advocates' and other libraries have been consulted, and information kindly communicated by personal friends is here gratefully acknowledged.
CONTENTS.
CHAPTEH. PACK.
I. Topographical, . . .1
II. Prehistoric, . . 12
III. Coming of the Romans, . . 20
IV. After the Romans, . . 2!» V. Relics of the Romans, . . 36
VI. St. Michael's of Inveresk, . . 50
VII. Time of Wallace and Bruce, . . 07
VIII. Dawn of the Reformation, . . ?'•'
IX. Reformation Period, . . 84
X. Ministry of Mr. Adam Colt, . 90
XI. Old Communion Cups, . .117
XII. Seventeenth Century Records, . 127
XIII. Parish Finance— XVII. Century, . 140
XIV. Close of XVII. Century, . 154 XV . Opening of -XVIII. Century, . . 1GO
XVI. Gloom followed by Sunshine, . . 168
XVII. Ministry of Dr. Carlyle, . . 175
XVIII. The Present Parish Church, . , 182
XIX. Dr. Moodie's and Mr. Beveridge's Ministries, 188
XX. Memorable Events, . . 190
XXI. Distinguished Parishioners, . . 203
XXII. Miscellanea, . 214
ILLUSTRATIONS.
PAGK.
1. Portrait of Author — Facing title page.
2. Communion Token, 1727 — Back of title page
3. Old St. Michael's, Inveresk — Facing Chap. I.
From Original Wator Colour Drawing taken in 1803, the property of Admiral of the Fleet, Sir Alex. Milne, Bart., G.C.B.
4. Communion Token, 1841 — Back of alternative
title page.
5. Inveresk Church, 1805— S. W. View, . . 10
6. Oldest Minute Book, 1651, . . .32
7. Pinkie House, General Sir Wm. Hope, Bart., C.B. , 48
8. Fac-simile half-page Account Book, 1655, . 04 0. Rev. Adam Colt, M. A., . . .80
From Portrait by Jameson at Gartaherrie House.
10. Inveresk House, J. A. Park, Esq., . . 90
11. Old Communion Plate, Charter Chest and Records, 112
12. Crest of Earl of Dunfermline— Page 117, . 128
13. Memorial Stone, Carberry Hill, where Queen
Mary surrendered to the confederate Lords, 144
14. Monument of William Smyth, Town Clerk, . 100
Stone Buried 1805, Recovered 1894.
15. Rev. Alexander Carlyle, D.D., . .170
10. West End High Street, Musselburgh, . . . 192
Showing old house in which Commissioner Cardonnel received
Smollett the Novelist, now removed.
17. Specimens of New Communion Plate, . . 208
18. Bit of Old Fisherrow, North Side, High Street, . 224
Site now occupied with modern tenement.
I.
called Innerask and JVlu--* ; juuct designation has since then
The parish is about three rail* .' south, and from two to two and a-h&if i to west. Its northem boundary is the the Firth* of Forth from Ravenshaugh east to Magdalen burn on the weftt iies of Duddingstoh, Newton, and U- wn adjoin it or> the v .
• same county oi) thr - iuU
-tliS »>> .
into the Fir of that posj
of antiquity. "»'-. - u: meai
similar coinjxjuu^ mmon tn
A
TOPOGRAPHICAL.
TNVERESK is an ancient and historic parish in the north-east of the county of Mid-Lothian. Cp The burgh of Musselburgh forms part of it. Until early in the eighteenth century it was called Innerask and Musselburgh, but this con- junct designation has since then been dropped.
The parish is about three miles from north to south, and from two to two and a-half from east to west. Its northern boundary is the shore of the Firth of Forth from Ravenshaugh burn on the east to Magdalen burn on the west. The parishes of Duddingston, Newton, and Liberton in Mid-Lothian adjoin it on the west, Dalkeith and Cranstoun in the same county on the south, and Tranent and Prestonpans in Haddingtonshire on the east.
The Esk divides the parish into two nearly equal parts from south to north, and empties itself here into the Firth. The name Inveresk is significant of that position, and in itself contains evidence of antiquity. With a like geographical meaning similar compound place-names are common enough,
A
2 INVERESK PARISH LORE.
but few indeed can tell as much as this one does. Esk comes out of a very old stock. Variations of it are found in Ax, Ex, Ox, Ux, Ouse, Uisque, Usk, Esce, all meaning water, and in many of these forms it is applied to rivers in Great Britain. Such root words, descriptive of the natural features of a country, i.e., rivers, mountains and the like, cling with firm hold in common speech, while names given to places of abode are more subject to change when people of a different language become occupants. The importance of word study is coming more and more to be re- cognised. The very form of the word Inveresk helps to discover its history. It has been found that in words in use in Celtic times the descriptive part comes after the root portion ; in those of Anglic or Saxon origin the reverse holds good. We are thus enabled to fix the period to which Inveresk belongs, and to trace it to the time of the Angles. Escernuthe, the name by which the earliest of the Saxon invaders knew it, is un- questionably Celtic. Esk, Eskmouth, Carberry (Caerbarren) have come down from the aboriginal Britons whom the Romans encountered. According to a recent writer on the subject of place-names, Musselburgh in its original form, signified " the fenced town of the Picts." When thus examined, the names of parish and burgh are, in themselves, charters of an antiquity sufficiently remote to
TOPOGRAPHY. 3
gratify the most exacting, and with which parish- ioner and burgess may feel proudly content.
As an example of the intuitive or traditional hold which successive generations retain of the original meaning of a very old word, it may be mentioned that nothing was more common half-a- century ago than to hear people in the parish speak of the Esk as the " watter." Nor was this a mere localism, as the writer thus discovered. When a small boy he enjoyed a jaunt to a pretty Tweedside Town. On asking for some water, the request was met with the query, " Waeter-waeter or well-waeter ? " That is to say, was river water or pump water, water to wash in or water to drink wanted ? River water was thus waeter-waeter, where the waeter was said to wax and to wane ; and the same root idea was presented to the mind within sight of the Cheviots on the banks of the Tweed as within sight of the Pentlands on the banks of the Esk. To return to descriptive details, it may be pointed out that at the confluence of the Esk with the estuary, the Firth of Forth reaches its most southerly limit and its greatest width. The distance across is more than three times what it is between Granton and Burntisland, and fully eight times greater than where the Forth Bridge joins the two shores. What secondary causes have com- bined to scoop out the large elliptical bay that extends from Hound Point to Gullane, is a
4 INVERESK PARISH LORE.
subject beyond the scope of this work. That glacial action had some share in the work, the presence of huge boulders upon the foreshore indicates. Whatever forces were employed, the Esk must have proved a counter-active. The tend- ency of rivers is to accumulate the soil they bear seawards near their mouths, and to cause the land to encroach on the sea. The present influence of the stream affords no index of the power it formerly had, and gives but a faint idea of its energy when it ran a broad, deep and rapid river before its sources were impounded for district supply.
The bay of Musselburgh furnishes shelter and good anchorage, and is much frequented by shipping when a storm rages in the North Sea or an easterly gale drives up the Firth.
The surface of the parish next the coast and near the river is comparatively flat, but rises to an elevation of 514 feet at Carberry Hill. Next the shore is the burghal portion which competent authorities consider to be an upraised sea level. It is fan shaped, the pivot point being at the parish church. For a considerable distance along the beach on either side of the mouth of the Esk, there is extensive links, which in England would be called downs. Dr. Carlyle writes in his article upon the parish in Sir John Sinclair's Statistical Account of Scotland, that every burgess of Mussel-
TOPOGRAPHY. 5
burgh had a right of pasturage on the links. When such individual privileges came no longer to be per- mitted, this pasturage, which still formed part of the common good of the burgh, was until com- paratively recently rouped annually. From time immemorial the links have been used as recreation ground by the inhabitants, but that portion to the east of the river is most widely known from being the golfing green and race course with which the name of the burgh is associated. At the time the present parish church was built, Musselburgh links was used as a military camp and drill ground. Later on, troops returned from the seat of war were sent here to recruit; and the value of the station as a sanatorium came to be so fully re- cognised that, when the British Army was reduced to a peace establishment after the battle of Water- loo, the cavalry barracks would have been erected at Musselburgh instead of at Piershill, but for some local obstacles that intervened.
Portions of the old sea margin which runs par- allel to the south shore of the Firth can be traced crossing the parish. Upon one part of this eleva- tion the Parish Church and village of Inveresk are situated. Its strategic importance at this point was so evident that the Romans established upon it an important station, which will be noticed in its proper place.
In the able treatise on " Traces of Ancient Water
{> INVERESK PARISH LORE.
Lines in Scotland," by the late Mr. David Milne Home, we find the following notice of the old sea margin just referred to : " At Musselburgh, a bank more or less steep, can be traced from Joppa, south of Portobello, crossing Magdalene Burn, New Hailes policy, the river Esk, the fields north of Inveresk Church, the grounds of Inveresk House, eastward by Pinkie Burn, and as far as Drummore Lodge at the east end of Musselburgh Links. The base of the bank is about 28 feet above high water. At Newbigging, the bank is distant about one and a-half miles from the existing shore. It is cut through by the Magdalene Burn, the river Esk and also by Pinkie Burn. This bank is in the boulder clay. It seems probable that, when the sea stood at the above level of 28 feet, the river Esk did not follow its present course to the sea, west of Inveresk Church, where there is now a vertical cliff. If that passage near Monkton village, Monk- tonhall, were blocked, a great lake would be formed, whose west margin would coincide with the long ridge of gravel running north from Camp-end, properly Kaimend, and the overflow of the lake would be by the small valley at Pinkie Burn situated to the east of Inveresk."
Elsewhere, in the same volume, Mr. Milne Home shows how closely the height above high water of this bank at Inveresk approximates to similar levels at other points on the shore of the Firth, and
TOPOGRAPHY. 7
gives reasons for concluding that the present re- duced area and lower level of the estuary had been reached before the time of the Roman occupation.
The soil of the parish ranges from light sandy loam to heavy and clayey land. It is generally fertile and productive, and is highly cultivated. The most approved methods of modern husbandry are followed, and the implements employed are of the most recent construction. Dr. Carlyle, the Parish Minister of Inveresk during nearly the whole of the latter half of last century, may be claimed to have been the first to give an impetus to the im- provement which has since made steady progress. Down to the doctor's time the heavy lumbering ox plough continued to be used, and required not only a ploughman but a driver to manage the yoke. An ingenious blacksmith in Dalkeith, having con- structed one of an improved type which a pair of horses could draw and a single man handle, Dr. Carlyle was shrewd enough to perceive its value, and at once employed it upon a farm he held. His neighbour, the Rev. Dr. Grieve of Dalkeith, did the same. The farmers round about laughed at this departure from use and wont, and doubtless cracked many a joke at the parsons' expense at their market- day meetings. But Jupiter lets us into the secret of his own and his friend's faith : — " They were acquainted with the practice of the ancients in this particular ;" and, when the second year's crops
8 INVERESK PARISH LORE.
under the new method came to be reaped, the increased yield and improved quality proved the men of the manse to be right, and the auld wives of the mains to be wrong.
Between the present condition of agriculture and its state last century the distance is immense. In 1760, the rental of land was 20/- to 25/- per acre, and up till then no bread but oat-cakes were the daily fare of working people. A plough- man's weekly wage was 5/-, and as the necessaries of life occasionally touched famine prices the pinch at times must have been hard indeed. About the year just mentioned, "some 700 acres in the fields of Inveresk" were divided among the neighbouring lairds and afterwards enclosed. The Howe Mire, part of the battlefield of Pinkie, had been previously a stagnant morass with ague and fever prevalent around it. Now, no portion of the parish is more healthy or yields better crops. The lave, as well as the lairds, have therefore been sharers in the gain.
The parish is well furnished with growing timber. Much planted last century has attained considerable size. Some of it is deserving of special notice. In the Duke of Buccleuch's policies, there are several fine specimens of the cedars of Lebanon near the Smeaton Entrance Lodge, and at another part are a number of very venerable oak trees, believed to be a remnant of the once
TOPOGRAPHY. 9
extensive forest which extended from Craigmillar to the Esk, in the days when the Scottish Kings found in it a favourite hunting ground.
The air is pure, the climate healthy and the death rate low. After a long struggle with the timid, who dread any departure from what they have been accustomed to, and with those self- constituted guardians of public interests, who oppose every measure that involves outlay how- ever beneficial, the advocates of progress prevailed, and a water supply and drainage system, properly constructed footpaths and carriage ways were secured. As a result, the sanitary condition has been advanced, and unsavoury dwellings are in the way of becoming a thing of the past. With an increasing attention to cleanliness, — personal, domestic and local, — and the supervision of pro- perly qualified and energetic officials, the reputation of the locality, as a desirable place of residence, pro- mises to become more conspicuous, and it is hoped it will rightfully take its place among the most popular of Scottish health resorts. Already capital has been attracted towards it for the erection of dwelling-houses of a superior class, and the manner in which these have been taken up proves that the investment will yield a fair return.
For situation and surroundings there are few places the parish need envy. Its old minister, Dr. Carlyle, claimed it to be " one of the most beautiful
10 IXVERESK PARISH LORE.
in Scotland," and he was not a man given to vapouring. Thomas Carlyle — uncompromising, hard headed and plain-speaking — is every bit as compli- mentary. In his elucidation of one of Cromwell's Musselburgh letters this occurs : — " We march, with defiant circumstance of war, round all accessible sides of Edinburgh; encamp on the Pentlands, return to Musselburgh for provisions; go to the Pentlands again — enjoy one of the beautifulest prospects, over deep-blue seas, over yellow corn- fields, dusky Highland mountains, from Ben Lomond round to the Bass again."
Those who have visited the most famous sights in Europe have looked upon these same panoramic and historic scenes with admiration: others who have made acquaintance with the choicest landscapes of the West have been no less enamoured by them. Here the eye passes from Craigmillar, where Queen Mary stayed, to Car- berry, where she surrendered ; from the battle- field of Pinkie, where the Scots were routed, to that of Prestonpans where Charlie won ; from the fortalice of Fa'side to the tower of Preston ; from the fourteenth century turrets of Pinkie to the four hundred year old Clock Steeple of Mussel- burgh. Otherwise the view takes in the Pentlands and the Moorfoots, the Lammermoors and the Garletons, with North Berwick Law and the Bass like solitary sentinels on out-post duty. From the
TOPOGRAPHY. 11
German Ocean and Isle of May the sweep of the vision embraces the waters of the Firth, reflecting the wing-like canvas of sailing-craft, and streaked with the dusky trail of steamers' smoke. It steals along over the fair fields and busy towns dotted upon the Fifeshire Coast from Earlsferry to King- horn, from Inchkeith to Leith, from Arthur's Seat to Aberdour, from the woods of Dalmeny to the summit of Dumyat. Under exceptional conditions the higher summits of the Perthshire Grampians that rise above Strathmore are seen to overtop the nearer ranges in Fife and Forfar; and Ben Lomond, Ben Ledi and Ben Voirlich stand out clear and distinguishable against the evening sky. If within the compass of this horizon the eye may enjoy a perpetual feast, the mind becomes a participant in the pleasure when memory recalls the royal cavalcades, the processions of mitred dignitaries, the state welcomes, the military spectacles, the gorgeous funerals, the gay, splendid, solemn, sad history-making events that the parish has wit- nessed.
II.
PREHISTORIC.
DOZEN years ago, anything known of human life in the parish before the com- r *- mencement of the Christian era, was in the main conjectural. With the dawn of record the story began, but from the darkness beyond, light has since come, and the barrier previously im- penetrable, has been partially unclosed. What the written page was searched for in vain, memorials of man found in the soil have revealed.
At Magdalen Bridge, close to the north-western boundary of the parish, a series of nine funereal urns were found about ten years since, in the strata of sand and gravel which immediately underlays the surface. These are preserved in the National Antiquarian Museum, Edinburgh. In one of these urns, a finely ornamented thin oval bronze blade was obtained, which placed their belonging to the bronze period beyond question. The dis- covery was looked upon as one of considerable importance, but it has been completely eclipsed by another more recently made at Kirk Park, immed- iately at the base of the eminence on which the
PREHISTORIC. 13
church and church-yard are situated. To meet a demand for sand suitable for building purposes, the late Bailie George Lowe had his field opened up, and in the same strata as that at Magdalen Bridge, a number of stone cists with human re- mains have been found. Six years ago a single urn containing calcined human bones was come upon, and it was sent to the Antiquarian Museum. Till the summer of 1893 the excavation proceeded without further discovery, but then no fewer than eighteen urns were disinterred. All these, excepting three which were hopelessly broken in the hand- ling, were acquired by the Queen's Remembrancer and are placed in the National Collection. There can be little doubt, the cemetery thus discovered was one of a remote antiquity, possibly an already forgotten one long before the first centuries of the Christian era. The collection of urns obtained in it includes the largest and smallest specimens ac- quired by the Museum, and it is particularly rich in examples of those tiny funereal vessels pierced with holes, which, in the absence of any certain knowledge of their purpose, have by some been called incense cups. Several of the urns have the simple punctured interlinear ornamentation pecu- liar to the Bronze period neatly carried round them, while one of the smaller held the cremated bones of an infant not more than three or four months old. Although it may be impossible to fix
14 INVERESK PARISH LORE.
the exact date when these interments took place, one of the best qualified to form an opinion assigns them to a period not less than 600 B.C.
Following the view taken by this expert, a colony is seen to have been settled in the parish fi ve and twenty centuries ago ; and if it be granted that the remains contained in the cists and urns unearthed are probably those of its more impor- tant members only, then its numbers may be reckoned to have been all the larger.
Of those whose dwellings nestled and whose remains have thus been found it is possible to learn something, from what has been ascertained to be characteristic of the era in which they lived. This little community may be considered to have its counterpart in an Indian wigwam or in the village life of Central Africa at the present day. It was, however, advanced beyond the state of primitive man. Already it had learned that in a settled abode, greater security was to be obtained than fell to the lot of the isolated and migratory who lead a nomad life. In some of the industries progress had also been made. Their knowledge of the potter's art had, doubtless, come down from ancestors who had brought it with them when the British Isles still formed part of the continent of Europe. The form and finish given to the earthen- ware vessels already described, when put in comparison with others belonging to the Stone
PREHISTORIC. 15
period, show a considerable advance, the latter being less shapely and sun-dried, — not fire-baked. For food supplies they would depend mainly upon hunting and fishing and such edible plants as they could find.
But what of their mental condition, what of them as thinking men ? Surely the methods taken to preserve the bones of their departed and the articles sometimes put in the tomb beside them appear to suggest that they had some idea of a hereafter, and that their conception was no longer content with looking for it to be simply a happy hunting ground. A nobler belief seems to have begun to make way among them, an anticipation of good things desired, but denied ; — rest and peace in place of toil and war. Faint and feeble that anticipation may have been, but if sym- bolism has any meaning they appear to have hoped that the sword, which had been often handled to defend or defy, would no longer be required, and its fragments therefore find their place in the funereal urn.
With these ancient Britons, years passed as they do still. To gladness and gloom, mirth and sadness, care and toil, they were no strangers. On the rain- cloud they saw God's bow pencilled, and, perchance even to their untutored minds it was not without a message. Such is a glimpse of the early colony at this spot which recent discoveries have given.
16 INVERESK PARISH LORE.
But to a far higher past the mind is led by another discovery made at Olive Bank about eleven years since. In the strata already mentioned, a couple of large oak trees were found embedded at a con- siderable depth, not fossilized, but sound and serviceable. The novelty of the find procured for it prominence and publicity. Before removal, the trees were examined in situ by distinguished geologists and archaeologists, Such questions as whence and how they had come, and how long they had remained there were carefully considered. The result assigned them to a period 6,000 years ago.
Two noble mantelpieces were made from one of them, and with a plank of the timber, formed an attractive group in the Forestry Exhibition, Edin- burgh, 1884. The catalogue entry reads: — "One Dining-room and one Hall Mantelpiece, and one plank from an Oak tree of great age, probably at or about the time when Neolithic Man entered Britain."
Veritable vestiges of creation, it may with some confidence be affirmed, these trees did not fall where they were found, for they had a deep layer of pure sand below as well as above them. Nor had they been the victims of decay. Most likely they had either been uprooted by a hurricane or a flood, and had been transported on the bosom of the waters to the spot where they were found.
•mnenct
trees were oXAUttiu**} +n tiff 'Ji»i;i»guished
•^ists oui aivhwolugi*** >•"•::.. Tiaestions as whence and how th^y h«*i «*•.*«*•, how long
they had remained there wwrr The result ^siji-i»>i Uifitt t- -. j-- • ago.
noble niAiitelpioces were twa.sU rru** iheui, and with a plank of the timber, foini^i an
•tive ^roup in the Forestry Exhibition, : boj-^h, 1S84. The catalogue entry rt>.vlj»
ig-nx)in and one Hall Munt^ix>i"<~ ik from an Oak tree of great ag« p or about the time when N*s>hthK; Ms Britain.'
Veri^Hc; vestiges of creation, it m: confiu AM-, be affirmed, Uie^e tre»is when* they were found, for they n*-' of pvir<- sand below as well a> had ii*»v been the victims of d» - the} :or been uproot^' \.-\
Horxi ;uj -Wen trau*r.Hvt<*l oij tin: bos
* i«> t!..- '.5>Mt VkK-rT- ti^ wm1 t
INVKRESK CHURCH, 1805.
PREHISTORIC. 17
Back through the long milleniums the mind may strain and peer, contemplate the planting of the acorns from which these giants of the forest sprung, watch them shoot up as tender saplings on through many years of luxuriant growth, and see in it all those very forces at work by which the Creator still accomplishes his purpose and fulfils his plan.
A retrospective survey of six thousand years looks large and long when considered by itself, or if measured by the span of a life-time or the changes of a century. Put, however, in comparison with geologic periods, its comparative magnitude is completely altered. The record of the 'rocks back even to the relatively recent carboniferous formations opens out a far wider view, and the story which it tells can here be read. Coal has been worked in the parish for nearly seven cen- turies. Between the years 1202 and 1218, the monks of Newbattle obtained right to work coal and stone on their lands of Preston, — i.e. Priest - town, — westward to Pinkie Burn, by charter from Seyer d'Quincy, Lord of the Manor of Tranent. Peat must also have been obtainable, for there occurs an entry in the chartulary of Kelso Abbey giving right to cast it at Easter Duddingston, to one Reginald d'Bosco, and faggots of course would be found in the neighbouring forest.
The coal field in Inveresk parish is part of the
B
18 INVERESK PARISH LORE.
great Lothian coal basin, which geologists say is of an older formation than that in Durham and Northumberland.
No fewer than forty seams are met with in the coal measures of the Lothians, and these vary from two-and-a-half to nine feet in thickness. The article " Inveresk " in the New Statistical Account, written in 1839 by the late Rev. J. G. Beveridge, contains interesting particulars of its geological features. In that admirably compiled descriptive notice, six collieries are mentioned, three at work, three recently before discontinued. The former were at New Craighall, Monktonhall, and Edmon- ston, the latter had been at Pinkie Burn, Midfield and Cowpits. All have been long closed. The withdrawal from so many workings is not due to the supply having been exhausted, but to the difficulty and expense of reaching the lower seams having become greater than the enterprise could bear. In the endeavour made to cope with the difficulties presented, a great pumping engine was put down at the New Craighall pit that at the time was reckoned a marvel of its kind. Of so great an interest was it the subject among engineer- ing circles at home and abroad, that an elaborate account of it was published in book form, about sixty years since, unique in this respect, that while one page was printed in English the other facing it was given in corresponding French. The remains
PREHISTORIC. 19
of the engine-house still stand in a field on Stoney- hill farm near Newhailes Station.
In all the coal pits already mentioned, and in those afterwards opened at Wallyford and Car- berry, animal and vegetable remains have been frequently found. The existence of this great accumulation of carboniferous strata tells of a time when the climate was tropical and vegetation dense. On the other hand some of the fossils it contains, indicate an alternative aquatic condition necessary for their existence, and countenance the supposed presence of a great lake or sea, the denizens of which belonged to species no longer met with either in salt or fresh water.
III.
COMING OF THE ROMANS.
&
ftf/f ORE than half-a-century before the begin-
k"/i »
ning of the Christian era, Julius Caesar iV effected a landing in the south of Britain • and from the day he planted his standards upon her shores Britannia assumed a fresh importance. " Trade followed the flag " even then, and a con- quest by many reckoned worthless proved to be valuable. Before the end of the second century, barren Britain had become an exporting country, and was looked to for supplies of cattle, corn, etc., by the continent. But the Roman generals and the legions they commanded found it no child's play to establish the Imperial power and make it respected. The native races were hardy and brave, and many a well-contested battle had to be won before they yielded to the rule of the conqueror. Time was thus occupied, and it was not till Julius Caesar had been replaced by Julius Agricola that, somewhere about A.D., 80, the Roman troops penetrated into North Britain. These were not the days of electric telegraphs or military intelligence departments. Wheatstone
COMING OF THE ROMANS. 21
or Von Moltke had not yet arisen. But even as news speeds over the plains of India or tidings of a plentiful supply at market reach the coster- mongers of London with marvellous rapidity and by means inexplicable, so, doubtless, tidings of an enemy in the land would reach the little com- munity on the banks of the Esk at Musselburgh. Notwithstanding, in the meantime food would require to be obtained and the pot kept boiling as best they could. By-and-bye, like the nmt- terings of a coming storm, the news would be repeated. The stories of strife and struggle begin to come in more detail, and fugitives from the fight picture its horrors. Suddenly danger is at the door. A strange glittering mass is de- scried pouring over the height at Carberry, and on it the sunbeams flash and sparkle. What can it be ? Nothing else than the brass helmets, polished armour and glittering weapons of the approaching foe. What is to be done ? Time is precious but it is short. Hurriedly they prepare to defend their dwellings, and if need be sacrifice themselves for home's sake. These heroes of the hamlet are brave, but they are undisciplined, and neither in numbers nor in equipment have any chance against their assailants. Nearer the legionaries come with the steady tramp and soldiery bearing, and well- knit frames of men inured to discipline and danger. The orders of the centurions ring clearly out, a
22 INVERESK PARISH LORE.
change of formation is made, and the two forces stand face to face in deadly conflict. The fight does not last long, but it is riot ended till man}' a wound has been given, many a life lost, and victory won by the invader.
The troops of the Mistress of the World thus came to the shore of Bodotria — Sinus Orientalis — the Firth of Forth, displayed her eagles and estab- lished her rule, where we now call Inveresk. Whether our ancestors who were worsted in this fight had time to put on their war paint and turn out in review order history neglects to say. We know they were fond to do so, and need have no scruple in supposing they felt quite as important in their own estimation as any soldier who ever donned a uniform, when they had their persons bedaubed. Like the Chinese who encountered the British troops with a mighty din of drums and with banners bearing frightful monsters painted on them, these Britons doubtless vainly fancied their woaded bodies would scare off an enemy. Anyhow, this practice obtained for them the name by which they are now mostly known, viz. : — Picts, that is painted, of which we are reminded by the word depict.
The movement forward to Inveresk carried the great Roman road known as Watling Street from coast to coast along the island. From Dover it led to London and on to Chester. Reference to
COMING OF THE ROMANS. 23
a map shows that a line nearly due north from Chester, indicates pretty nearly the course it took by way of Carlisle, across the Cheviots, by Jed- burgh, Melrose, Gala Water, Borthwick and Vogrie to Inveresk.
Once settled in their new station these sons of Mars must have looked across upon the hills of Fife with some degree of awe. Strange stories were told them of the unknown land beyond. Its air was said to be so poisonous that whoever entered it died. Reserved to be the abode of departed spirits, it was in this way thought to be made secure against the intrusion of the living ; and from the horrors the natives associated with existence there, it was spoken of with bated breath as "the cold hell."
To propitiate the gods and place themselves right with the powers of the spirit world, was, however, the policy of the Romans. A singular proof of this is met with a few miles from Car- lisle, where an altar has been discovered and is to be seen, dedicated to a deity absolutely unknown in Rome but worshipped in Britain.
Of the colonia and municipium at Inveresk, little, if any, information can be obtained from the earliest accounts of the Romans in Britain. The topographical details given in these are fragmentary, often inaccurate and altogether in- sufficient to be of any service in this respect.
24 INVERESK PARISH LORE.
When inaccurate local geography can be met with in a highly prized production of a Historiographer Royal and in the interlocutor of a learned sheriff, no surprise need be felt nor disappointment ex- perienced, when the historians of antiquity fail to tell all we want to know. These historians had no unrivalled Atlas or Gazeteer of Geography to which to refer, no files of newspapers to which to turn. Tacitus had to depend rather upon the tales told around the camp-fires, when infantry, cavalry, seamen and marines rehearsed their do- ings, and in the desire of each arm to magnify the achievements of the branch of the service to which it belonged made what it had done as big as possible. With such exaggerations to draw upon the picture became distorted and out of pro- portion, and localities named difficult to identfy. Enough in itself, the obstacle thus met with has been enormously added to by the ingenious fer- tility with which imaginary resemblances of words in form of sound have been seized upon, and endeavour made to establish claims purely chimer- ical.
With good reason, "Delta" says in his most valuable brochure on "The Roman Antiquities of Inveresk" — "Of the Roman Itinera, north of the Tweed, we unfortunately know nothing more,— — nor can we now expect to do — than can be gathered through the geographical haziness of
COMING OF THE ROMANS 25
Ptolemy, who is far less distinct in his northern than in his southern charts ; from his emen- dator, Richard, the monk who flourished in the fourteenth century ; or from the still more unsatisfactory Ravenna Tables which are often inextricably confused and contradictory. With these three, and a few scattered passages of Bede and Gildas before them as their guides, our more modern writers on the Roman remains of Scotland have been left to the free scope of their fancies, in the application of recorded ancient names to particular places. Indeed, not above four or five sites among us can be distinctly affirmed to have been permanent military stations with adjacent Castra vEstrita, and with dependent colonia and municipia, as demonstrated by fosse and rampart lined with stone, — by the ruins of dwelling-houses and of sacella for family worship, — by the re- mains of harbours and aqueducts, causeways, and public baths. All these we know to have been found at Inveresk, yet, with all these, Inveresk was, until of late, almost totally overlooked and unmentioned."
Scarcely less emphatic in reprobation of what he calls phonetic etymology is the scholarly Skene. Even he, however, has not been proof against it, for in quoting from Bede mention of a town named Giudi, he builds upon an " if " a probable derivation of Inchkeith, and establishes the locality
26 INVERESK PARISH LO11E.
of the said town. Now, " if," is not accepted in any of the six books of Euclid as an equivalent for " which is demonstrated," nor can it be held to be so here, especially since, in the splendid work where this if has slipped in, the Esk is spoken of as in Haddingtonshire.
To some, this question of groping in the grey- past, blindman's-buff fashion, after identification of places named in ancient writings may seem hardly within the scope of a work like the present. We are quite aware it may be found fault with as occupying space that might have been better employed. But it may have more to do with our .subject than at first sight appears, and believing it has, we allow it to stand ; not forgetting that Lord Hailes tells of having somewhere read of a Frenchman who charged Caasar with being pedantic, because he wrote his commentaries in Latin. This is no new-fangled subject. Exactly two hundred years ago Thomas limes took his degree as M.A. at Paris University, and some years afterwards he spent a winter chiefly in the Advocates' Library, Edinburgh, collecting materials for his able Essay on the Ancient Inhabitants of Scot- land. With singular felicity and penetration he deals with his subject, and ascribes much of the confusion and obscurity that is still experienced in the study of our country's history through its language, to the negligence and ignorance of
COMING OF THE ROMANS. 27
transcribers, and to the unfamiliarity of those of one age with the hand-writing of a previous. He points out, also, how the affinity of the Pictish, Irish-Gaelic, and British tongues, and the blend- ing of the races when the Pictish and Scottish Kingdoms were joined in the ninth century together contributed so to revolutionize the lan- guage that, before the middle of the twelfth century the Pictish tongue completely disappeared.
History, antiquarian research and tradition agree in regard to what followed upon the Roman General establishing a station at Inveresk. Un- like the methods of merciless extirpation or woe- ful servitude adopted by later usurpers, Agricola is credited with having established a firm admin- istration. He demanded obedience, and made order and justice to be respected. For races in an early stage of civilization this has proved the form of government from which most advantage is obtained. The policy of Agricola his successors continued, and its success became manifest. Build- ings were erected such as the district and country had never before possessed, military works were constructed, usages were introduced which were previously unknown, and that system of juris- prudence was established to which Scotland has tenaciously clung.
Some writers affirm that the centurions and soldiers of those legions which served at the Firth
28 IXVEBESK PARISH LORE.
of Forth took kindly to their quarters, and the statement receives confirmation from what has been discovered of the buildings they erected. We have heard the Bay of Musselburgh compared not unfavourably with the Bay of Naples ; and assum- ing there must be some warrant for the compari- son, the seeming resemblance may have been observed by the sons of the peninsula, and this northern station have reminded them of their sunny southern homes. Be this as it may. it is on re- cord that when recalled A.D. 409 to fight for the tottering empire, they parted from their position with regret and felt it to be a wrench to leave behind many fruits of their industry, skill, and enterprise.
IV.
AFTER THE ROMANS.
"NDER the administration of the Roman gover- nors, Britain rapidly advanced in wealth. The tribute exacted was hard to bear, but the security enjoyed enabled industry to thrive and the arts of peace to prosper. Beside fortified positions communities gathered and towns grew. The massive walls by which these towns were surrounded afforded protection against attack. In the more populous were constructed magnificent buildings, worthy of Rome herself in respect of architecture. An incidental notice by Bellesheim of a fountain at Carlisle, " the wondrous work of Roman hands," indicates how greatly the resources of Britain had been developed and to what noble purposes they were in part applied.
Nor was the influence of western civilization confined to towns. The provincial Briton of posi- tion imitated his military masters and conformed to their mode of living. There thus arose villas provided with all the comforts common to an Italian noble's home. In many a secluded spot were then first seen the counterparts of the mansions and country houses of more modern times. In these
30 INVERESK PARISH LORE.
villas luxury abounded, golden vessels were used, jewelled armour was worn, banquets were spread, and revels held. These old times have been thought to be rude and barbarous, but in them were a rough refinement and a heroic chivalry, undaunted courage in the face of danger coupled with lamentable weakness in presence of temptation — the human nature of the nineteenth century reflected in that of the fifth and sixth.
But when the Roman legions had departed, and the firm hand that could shield as well as compel was no longer felt, a time of unrest and trouble set in. Across the sea tidings of the fertility of the land reached the fair-haired Frisian farmer folk, and they were not slow to come to fight and settle. Pinched circumstances at home, prospect of plenty abroad have ever set up the problems which emi- gration and immigration seek to solve. Among the first to descry the keels of the Teutons making headway for the shore were the men of Lothian. An estuary or navigable river offered the readiest access from the great sea, bend or bay provided shelter, and a gravelly bed afforded the anchorage and safe landing indispensable if a footing was to be maintained among a hostile people. It is to be remembered that such conditions led to the selection of the sites of our oldest coast towns. Something more than mere conjecture, therefore, favours the presumption that the first encounter with the in-
AFTER THE ROMANS. 31
vaders must have taken place at the mouth of the Esk or in its neighbourhood, for no more vulnerable spot is to be met with between Duncansby Head and Dover.
That the Frisians overcame those who had been dwellers in the land for a thousand years, the " tons," " wicks," and " hams," dotted over it plainly prove. Elphinstoii, Dolphinston, Edrnondston, Dud- dingston, are to the immediate south, east and west of Inveresk. Further off, Arniston, Colinton, Car- rington, Gilmerton, Ormiston, Garleton, Dirleton, Haddington, Borthwick and Tynninghame, tell the same tale of an Anglic invasion and the displace- ment of the native race. It may be observed all these tons are more or less inland. Farmer-folk do not want a stretch of gravelly beach but of land for tillage, and in choosing these sites, the Frisians showed they knew what their calling re- quired and settled themselves accordingly.
Green, in his " History of the English People " and in " The Making of England," names Elphinston, Dolphinston, Duddingston, Edmondston, all near neighbours of Inveresk, as reminders of the Elphins, Dolphins, Doddings and Edmonds who there first set up their homesteads ; he further tells that from their blood -bond and folkmote, the Anglo-Saxon Witenagemot sprung, and that out of this germ the whole system of public justice and representative government in Great Britain, step by step, has been
32 INVERESK PARISH LORE.
developed. As confirmatory of what has been already stated, Covington, Lamington, Symington, Thankerton are little townships in Lanarkshire far away from sea or shore amid pastoral hills near the head waters of the Tweed, but directly ac- cessible from the coast by the course of that river, and from Berwick — the fort on the bay.
Into the struggle between Briton and Teuton, an element entered which was bound to increase its bitterness. Christianity had penetrated into Britain, while the German races were still so far out of the stream of commerce, or what might now-a-days be called the tourists' track, that the missionaries of the new faith had never reached them. Unchristianised and dwellers in the heath, heathen came to be synonomous with non-Christian. Of this struggle we can best learn from Aneuriii the bard and Gildas the historian, who were pro- bably eye-witnesses, certainly contemporaries of the events they record in song and story. Grue- some is the narrative of Gildas. War in its most appalling wantonness he portrays. The very con- fusion of his tale points to its having been written amid the terrible commotion. A battle lost meant a town destroyed, promiscuous slaughter, and the unburied dead left to feed the eagles or beasts of prey.
Aneurin in the " Gododin " sings a rhythmic weird battle dirge, for the flower of British chiefs
As conti , ','ovin i on an
*V»y from s«a or si 'iead water* of from the eon from Berwick— t Into the ^ an elemcnl t.-i« its
Britain, while out of
HUH been
• far
fort, on the bay. iween Briton and Teuton . lieh wm» bound to incroaHe into
o oahir-
in tl; nou iearn fn-u
rian. v. <><> were pivo-
, contuuiporaries of
-ong and fltory. Grue-
MS War in its most
portrays. The very, con-
••. o its having be«n written
>!;on. A batt'e \\#>i laeant
•- ;cuous slau: the
feed the eagle« >;i be«tsi*j of
iodin " aingy & ? flower of i
kythmie
FACSIMILE OLDEST SESSION MINUTE-BOOK.
AFTER THE ROMANS. 33
slain in the decisive and disastrous encounter at Catraeth and Gododin. The battle lasted through- out an entire week, and the Bri tains were com- pletely vanquished. The scene of this conflict is placed by different interpreters of the poem in districts so far apart as Yorkshire, Cumber- land, and Lothian. Those who favour the last acknowledge that the district extended from the Esk to the Pentland Hills and westward to the Roman Wall and the river Carron. Eidyn is sought to be identified with Edinburgh simply because of its similarity in form and sound. Sixty years since, William and Robert Chambers acknowledged it to be quite uncertain that Aneurin meant by Eidyn " the place now called Edinburgh," and no further discovery locates it with certainty. Several con- siderations point all the other way. The date of the battle of Gododin is variously given A.D. 570, 580, 596, and the bard who sings mournfully of it described himself as then an aged man. Edwin who founded Edwin's burgh did not begin to reign till A.D. 617. Chambers quotes Simon of Durham to show that in A.D. 854, Edinburgh must • have been a considerable village. It could hardly have been the City of Eidyn two-and-a-half to three centuries earlier. But, besides the mention of Dinas Eidyn, what is to be said of the " hall " of Eidyn where the mailed warriors assembled, where the mead cup was drained ; and the revelry c
34 INVERESK PARISH LORE.
of feasting, all too surely, left chiefs of whom Aneurin sang, unfitted for the fight. Of such a "hall" in Edinburgh in Aneurin's day, fable and legend, record and ruin are together silent.
Facts on the other hand favour the fancy that Aneurin may have meant Inveresk by Eidyn. Here were a municipium and colonia, and the remains of a Roman villa prove a banqueting hall had been also. The particulars the bard supplies being thus found in one of the districts assigned as the site of the battle, it is just as likely as not that district saw the end of the conflict, and that the effacement of its buildings followed the defeat of the native army.
During well-nigh two centuries wave after wave of Germanic invaders dashed upon the British coasts and pressed evermore for larger elbow- room. Throughout these generations, the ancient race was confronted with a foe whose policy was all or nothing. Victorious, pitiless destruction left nought to tell of who or what had been. Defeated, they only retired to try again. Made of the same stuff as those whom Napoleon contemptuously called a nation of shopkeepers, they were equally resolute and in the end successful. From them the Anglo-Saxon race has come. The lowland Scotcli of Lothian is a survival of purest Early English, and after fourteen centuries it still retains a family resemblance of the parent Deutsch.
AFTER THE ROMANS. 35
Writing of the English settlement, Green says, " In other lands, in Spain, or Gaul or Italy, though they were equally conquered by German peoples, religion, social life, administrative order still re- mained Roman. In Britain alone, Rome died into a vague tradition of the past." ..." The villas, the mosaics, the coins which we dig up in our fields are no relics of our English fathers, but of a Roman world which our fathers' sword swept utterly away." . . . "The new England was a heathen country. The religion of Woden and Thor tri- umphed over the religion of Christ." The battle of Gododin was won by the worshippers of Odin.
V.
RELICS OF THE ROMANS.
IN the preceding chapter it has been shewn how the structures erected by the Romans in ty Britain were demolished and how the memory of them came to be effaced. Just as the spade of the excavator has brought to light treasures in Babylon and Nineveh, so has it discovered the evidence of Roman greatness in Britain. Bath and Chester have been rich in revelations, and the mounds of Silchester, till very recently only supposed possibly to mark the site of a Roman station, are now known positively to have covered that of Cavella. Like these posts in the south, Inveresk passed into oblivion till relics of its occupation revived the tale.
First among these remains may be noticed an ancient, buttressed bridge of three spans which crosses the Esk close to Musselburgh Railway Station. It is now only open for foot passengers and is locally called the Roman or the Auld Brig. This designation is at once right and wrong. Wrong, in so far that nothing of Roman handiwork remains seen, — right, as to its being of Roman
RELICS OF THE ROMANS. 37
origin. Even though it bears a considerable re- semblance to the Pont Sista at Rome, this bridge lacks certain features which pertain to those of Roman construction. But the explanation of this difficulty was at length obtained. Previous to the completion of the bridge designed by Rennie further down the stream, and while its earlier neighbour was still used for vehicular traffic, it became necessary to have the latter repaired. This was in 1809. Sir John Hope of Pinkie, Convener of the District Road Trustees, took advantage of the opportunity and had the face of one of the buttresses opened up. Inside the outer building, remains of still older masonry resting upon trans- verse oaken beams were found. The foundations upon which that masonry rested and the materials of which it was composed, put its Roman origin beyond question. So great an authority as Mr. Billings had no hesitation in assigning this bridge in its present form to the early part of the four- teenth century. His experienced eye, however, at once detected a peculiarity which no builder in ordinary circumstances would have indulged in. This consists of the exceptional depth between the top of the two northmost arches and the roadway above them. Mr. Billings saw in this reason to think it probable an outer casing had been put over the original but decayed structure, as has been done in providing a new head office for the Bank of
38 INVERESK PARISH LORE.
Scotland in Edinburgh. In the case of the Mussel- burgh bridge, it appears the Romans' work remains enclosed, but the outer walls of the old bank office- were cleared away after the new shell was put around them.
The importance of this bridge was not only local but national. It formed the main approach to Edinburgh from the south for more than a thou- sand years, and its maintenance was made the subject of enactments by the Scottish Parliament. Mr. Kirkpatrick Sharpe says Lady Janet Hepburn " built ye Bridge of Musselburgh." After the loss of her husband, Lord Seton, who fell at Flodden, Lady Janet, in her widowhood, applied much of her wealth in benefactions. She was the first prioress of the nunnery at Sciennes near Edinburgh, and a liberal contributor to its erection. Had Lady Janet done what Mr. K. Sharpe attributes to her, the bridge would not have needed mending so soon as 1597, as we learn from an Act of the Scottish Parliament it did. This looks more like an "old shoe " requiring to be " reclouted."
The discovery of remains already mentioned and the acknowledged existence of Roman roads to and from this bridge, entitle it to a foremost place among existing Roman relics at Inveresk.
A large slab of concrete within the policies of Inveresk House is the next object to claim at- tention. This is part of the floor of a bath found
RELICS OF THE ROMANS. 39
in January 1783, near where it is placed. The following from the pen of Dr. Alexander Carlyle tells how it was found and what it is : — " If there had remained any doubt concerning the situation of this Roman fort, it was fully cleared up a few years ago, when the proprietor of a villa, having occasion to take two or three feet off the surface of his parterre, there were then discovered the floors and foundations of various buildings. The owner being absent, attending his duty in parliament, the workmen were prevailed upon, by the author of this account, to clear the earth carefully away from one of them, and to leave the ruins standing for some time for the inspection of the curious. It was found to be a Roman bath of two rooms. The superstructure had been thrown down and removed, but the floor remained entire, and about six inches high of the wall of the smallest room, which was nine feet long and four-and-a-half wide. There was a communication for water by an earthen pipe through the partition wall. The other room was fifteen feet by nine. The floors of these, and of the other rooms, were covered with tarras uni- formly laid on, about two inches thick. Below this coat there was a coarser sort of lime and gravel five inches deep, laid upon unshapely and unjointed flags. This floor stood on pillars two feet high, some of stone, some of circular bricks. The earth had been removed to come to
40 IXVERESK PARISH LORE.
a solid foundation on which to erect the pillars. Under the tarras of the smallest room, there was a coarser tarras, fully ten inches thick, which seemed intended to sustain or bear a more con- siderable fire under it than the Hypocaustum of the largest room. There appeared to have been large fires under it, as the pillars were injured by them, and there was found a quantity of charcoal in perfect preservation. The Hypocaustum of the larger room, or space under the tarrassed floor, was filled with earth, and with flues made of clay, which were laid everywhere between the rows of pillars, and were a little discoloured by smoke ; a smaller degree of heat having been conveyed through them than through those under the other room. But these contrivances under the floors seem only to have been intended to preserve heat in the water, which had been conveyed heated from a kettle, built up or hung on brickwork, on one side of the largest room. This brickwork was four feet square, and much injured by strong fires. This seems to have been a kind of building used by the Romans only for temporary use. The cement or tarras, sufficiently proves by whom it was made, as the Roman composition of that kind is superior to any of later ages. It is remarkable, that the tarras of the grand sewers under the city of Rome is of the same kind ; and it is related by travellers, that in the very ancient buildings in the
RELICS OF THE ROMANS. 41
kingdom of Bengal, the very same sort has been used. Two medals were found among the ruins, now in the possession of Robert Colt, Esq., owner of the villa, one of them of gold, much defaced, which is supposed to be of Trajan; another of copper on which the inscription is clear, Diva Faustina. There are traditional accounts, that in digging foundations of houses in Fisherrow, there have been found similar ruins of Hypocausta, which afford a proof that this station was not merely military, but was a Colonia Romana or Municipium ; that they had many houses and buildings near the sea, as well as their prcetoriv/ttl at Inveresk; and that one of their principal harbours on this side of the Firth was at Fisherrow. From that harbour, situated where there is one at present, there was a Roman causeway, (the traces of which remained within the memory of men still living), which led to their camp at Sheriff Hall, three miles south- west and onwards to Borthwick."
Such, then, is the interesting narrative of Dr. Oarlyle, and the independent accounts given by others who were interested in the subject are to a like effect. The valuable work entitled Caledonia Romana has its notice of the discovery accompanied by a ground plan of the baths, and a view of the tarrassed floor resting upon its pillars. The altar- looking relic in Inveresk House grounds is thus seen to be a fragment of this tarras flooring dis-
42 INVERESK PARISH LORE.
interred a century ago. For many years another portion of it similarly elevated upon pillars stood in the gardens of Inveresk Gate, and was supposed erroneously to have been a Druidical altar. Admiral of the Fleet Sir Alexander Milne pre- sented it to the Antiquarian Museum about 1870.
Within this century, the vallum of the Roman citadel, which had a stone-faced rampart, could still be seen north-west from Inveresk House, but no traces of it remain.
Roman urns, medals, coins have been found repeatedly in the locality, and are mostly preserved in private collections, or have been handed over to the National Museum.
Entered by a stair from the court -yard of Inveresk House is an underground vaulted chamber. This is all now accessible of a subterranean passage over which the villa is built. The form of the arch is decidedly Roman, and the masonry in- dicates great antiquity. This passage is believed to have afforded means of communication between the interior of the fort and the colonia beyond. When the present approach from Newbigging.to Inveresk was made last century, a part of it was come upon.
A fine collection of sculptured and otherwise curious stones are carefully preserved in Sir Alexander Milne's grounds, some of which appear to be Roman relics.
KELIOS OF THE ROMANS. 43
Another object to be mentioned is the mound in the church-yard, north-west from the Church. The origin of this is shrouded in obscurity. Anti- quaries have wrangled over the question, some holding it to be Roman, others not. That it was used by the Duke of Somerset, and also by Oliver Cromwell as a battery mound is riot questioned, but that either constructed it, may well be doubted. The author of Caledonia Romaiia favours the opinion that the Romans formed this mound, and after offering reasons for his preference for this view, he points out that on a point so uncertain " the one view is, at all events, as pro- bable as the other."
Of recorded Roman remains nothing is heard till nearly a thousand years after the battle of Catraeth. In the time of Mary and Elizabeth, the first important local discovery of which we read was made. Great ado there must have been over it. Queens and statesmen thought it worthy of their consideration. Queen Mary dispatched a special messenger to the bailies of Musselburgh with her royal commands. The ambassador from the Court of St. James' made it the subject of official letters. Flattered and fluttered their hon- ours the bailies doubtless were by the arrival of a page in ruffles and lace, and when the queen's letter was delivered to them with courtly obei- sance by its youthful bearer. How proud some
44 INVERESK PARISH LORE.
of Musselburgh's modern civic magnates would have been to have had such an experience ! With reference to this business Queen Mary's Trea- surer's book has the entry following : — " April. 1565. Item, to ane boy passand of Edinburgh, with ane charge of the queen's grace, direct to the baillies of Musselburgh, charging them to take diligent heid and attendance that the monument of grit antiquitie, now fundin, be nocht demo- lishit nor broken down xii. D."
Mr. Randolph, English ambassador, wrote letters to the Earl of Bedford and to Sir William Cecil which, preserved in the State Paper Office, are given in full in vol. ii. of the Antiquarian Society's. Transactions. In the former of these letters the ambassador says, " For certayne ther is founde a cave besyde Muskelbourge, stounding upon a number of pillers made of tyle stones, curiously wroughte, signifyinge great antiquitie, and strange monuments found in the same. Thys cometh to my knowledge, besyde the common reporte, by the assurance of Alexander Clerke, whoe was ther to see yfc wch I wyll doe myself wth in these three or four days, and wryte unto your Lordship the more certayntie thereof, for I will leave nothing of yt unseen." In the second letter Mr. Randolph writes, " The cave found besyde Muskelbourge seemeth to be some monument of the Romaynes, by a stone that was found, with these words
RELICS OF THE ROMANS. 45
graven upon hym, Apollini Graiino Q.L. Sabianus, Proc. Aug. Dyvers short pillers. sette upright upon the grounde, covered with tyle stones, large and thyacke, torning into dyvers angles, and cer- tayne places lyke unto chynes (query, chimneys), to avoid smoke. This is all that I can gather thereof."
Sir Peter Young, tutor to James VI., also made a copy of the inscription, as follows : —
APOLLINI. GRANNO. Q. LUSINO. SABINIA.
NUM.
PROC. AUG. V. S. S. L. V. M.
" Apollini Granico, Quintus Lucius Sabinianus, Proconsul Augusti, votum susceptum solvit, lubens merito."
Twenty-eight years after the discovery of this dedicatory tablet, Napier of Merchiston interpolates " now utterlie demolished," into his account, but gives no hint as to who destroyed it. These were times of stress and storm. Only two years later the unfortunate Mary surrendered at Car- berry, and thenceforth her royal command did not count for much.
In 1827 some interesting remains were obtained
46 INVERESK PARISH LORE.
in Sir Alexander Milne's grounds during opera- tions connected with the formation of a sunk fence, and later, a conduit was there come upon, made of Roman tile and brick, together with a water run formed of oaken beams much decayed.
An entire volume might be occupied, were it attempted to enter into a detailed enumeration and description of the urns, coins, Samian ware, etc., etc., that have been found at different times in the parish, but this space forbids. Among the later finds may be mentioned a Denarius of Trajan got in the manse garden about 1864, and a particularly fine Roman urn, come upon when the foundations of Delta House, Inveresk, were ex- cavated. The former was sent by Rev. Mr. Beveridge, the latter by Mr. John Gavine, to the Antiquarian Museum.
Some notice must now be taken of the Roman roads which traversed the parish. In Patten's " Expedecion of his Grace of Somerset ; " that chronicler of the campaign furnishes a very de- tailed description of the locality at the time of the battle of Pinkie, in which this passage occurs : — " Fro this hil of Fanxside Bray descended my Lorde's Grace, my Lord- Lieutenant and another, along before their cape, (camp,) within less than ii flights shottes, into a lane or strete of a xxx feet brode, fenced on either side with a wall of turf, an elle of height; which way did lead
RELICS OF THE ROMANS. 47
straight northwards, and nie to a church called Saint Mighaels, of Undreske." Here, then, was one of the Roman roads leading to the fort, as this description exactly tallies with what is yet to be found of Watling Street elsewhere. On till the beginning of last century, the remains of the Roman harbour at Fisherrow, and of the via which led to and from it continued to exist. Adam de Cardonell the antiquary, and Maitland the historian so state. One branch of this via led south-west by way of Dalkeith, another pro- ceeding to the west, crossed Brunstane Burn, passed south of where Portobello has been built, onwards east of Restalrig Church and village, across the Water of Leith at the foot of Weigh House Wynd and thence to the Roman Wall.
In 1742, a seaman who served under Admiral Vernon in the Spanish Main, and was present at the battle of Porto Bello, built a cottage in sight of the sea on a lonely spot near the road just described between Musselburgh and Edinburgh. That cottage he named after the engagement. It remained standing till 1851, the old thatched house of Portobello. A relative of the present writer, who died in 1850, remembered it, solitary and alone. From this beginning, the popular watering-place which bears its name has grown. Ambitious to become a port like the two older towns on either side, a thousand loads of stones
48 INVERESK PARISH LORE.
were carted about 1780 from the Roman road close by, to the mouth of Duddirigston burn, to form a harbour. A further portion of the causeway was used in building the wall along- side the public road which encloses Craigenthiny farm, and which can be seen to consist almost entirely of cobble stones for a considerable dis- tance.
Chalmers, who collected materials for his Cale- donia with the utmost diligence says, "It is certain, as remains attest, that a Roman road led from Inveresk to Cramond, along the coast of the Forth." Than these roads and these remains, no better proof is needed to show Inveresk to have been a Roman Station, which Emperors and their lieutenants highly valued. We admit that this may not agree with the conclusions which others have arrived at, and , that the pages of many writers on the subject may be perused in vain for any reference at all to Inveresk as a Roman Station. But this by no means sets that claim aside or proves it to be unfounded. The secret which every ray of light reveals, the wisest and most learned failed to observe till far on in* the present century, but the germ to whicli science owes the splendid results of spectrum analysis was none the less present in every sunbeam. Because two of the most eminent of Scottish analytical chemists failed to detect a fatal impurity in water
tern.
less piv>
.res <>f jH)mse< * resk a* . Ht-ts that c infouruled. Ti ntveals, the \\ isest and wve till i • -the
germ- to ience
f spectnini - \vas
rery SL ol Scott-
RELICS OF THE ROMANS. 49
taken from a proposed source of supply for Musselburgh, and a third by a happy inspiration applied the required test and proved the presence of esparto liquor, the latter, simply because he stood alone was not to be discredited. On the contrary it was he who saved the community from the carrying forward of a scheme which would have proved a serious blunder, but which would certainly have been proceeded with, amid popular approval, had his report been in like terms to the other two.
" From all the circumstances, Inveresk Hill appears to have been a great station " is the testimony found in Gough's Camden. That the prsetorium stood where St. Michael's fane was reared appears certain. Sir Robert Sibbald writes : — " Et non longe a Musselbrugo versus meridiem sita, villa de Inveresk, que fluvio Esk, ad quern sita est, nomen habet ; ubi Castri Romani vestigia ceruntus, ubi nunc Templi csemiterium jacet."
1)
VI.
ST. MICHAEL'S OF INVERESK.
obtained a footing in Britain and made many converts during the Roman period. To Palladius, the Orygynale Crony- kil of Andro of Winton, ascribes the honour of being the pioneer missionary of the new faith. Be that as it may, the battle of Gododin, in the sixth century, was between professed Christians and worshippers of Wodin. If we accept the legend of St. Monenna of Ireland, the church of Saint Michael the Archangel at Inveresk was founded, erected and dedicated before that dis- astrous battle. As it appears in Celtic Scotland the legend tells that the early Scots of the sister isle came to Alban, not only to conquer but to convert. Saint Monenna is said to have founded seven churches in Scotland, and these at the principal fortified positions. Inveresk has been shown to be one of the latter, and so to rank among the number of mystic meaning. To place her title beyond question, one version of the legend is thus explicit : — " Apud Edinburgh in mentis cacumine in honore Sancti Michaelis alteram edi- ficavit ecclessiam ; " which can be read, " Near
ST. MICHAEL'S OF INVERESK. 51
Edinburgh a second church was reared in honour of Saint Michael, on the summit of the mount." No description could better point to Saint Michael's of Inveresk, Saint Michael's of Linlithgow being attributed to the same founder in the legend. To no church in Edinburgh can it apply. The seven churches said to have been erected by Saint Monenna are represented to have been planted at important places. This corresponds with apostolic practice. It was to seats of popula- tion that the first ambassadors of the Cross betook themselves, and through the converts thus made, the gospel spread into regions more sparsely peopled. The two churches just named, dedicated to St. Michael, are upon eminences. This, again, agrees with the practice of the early church, as Michael was by it regarded, pre-eminently, the guardian of mounts.
Saint Monenna died in 519, Saint Giles in 541, Saint Cuthbert in 687. Edwin, who founded Edinburgh, did not begin to reign till 618. Saint Michael's, Inveresk, must have been in existence before any of these dates. But it may be objected why should Edinburgh be mentioned in connection with an event which took place before it was in existence ? This is not difficult to account for. Monenna's zeal only received recognition by the Church, long after her life of pious endeavour. Centuries pass before canonization is conferred,
52 INVERESK PARISH LORE.
and not till then does the legend of the saint take definite form. Before the legend passed as current coin, Edinburgh had arisen, and what St. Mouenna had done near it, found its proper place in the story. Proverbs have been well styled the .crystallized wisdom of the past, and so legendary tradition tells frequently a more truth- ful tale than written page which owes its origin to a partisan pen.
Dedications to St. Michael were numerous throughout Christendom. In the time of St. Monenna, Art had not yet been employed as the handmaid of Religion. But men's minds were moved and their lives influenced by the thoughts which Art afterwards gave expression to by sculp- ture, on the canvas, or in painted window. The symbolism met with in representations of St Michael help to explain the secret of the venera- tion he received. The particular idea associated with the patron saint of Inveresk may be held to be that which the crest borne upon the old com- mon seal of the burgh of Musselburgh embodies. By it Saint Michael is represented as a mailed warrior witli outspread wings, youthful, vigilant, valiant, the spear in his right hand, the cross upon his shield, and the vanquished dragon pro- strate beneath him. In this is signified one of the oldest and most precious hopes that ever cheered man's heart, the ultimate triumph of the spirit
ST. MICHAEL'S OF INVERESK. 53
of good over the spirit of evil. As one of the emblems of this archangel most frequently met with, when it was a freeman's privilege to fight and when to be uneducated in letters was accounted honourable, such symbols had their use.
Dante says in Paradisic : —
" To speak thus is adapted to your mind,
Since only through the sense it apprehendeth,
What then it worthy makes of intellect.
On this account the Scripture condescends
Unto your faculties, and feet and hands,
To God, attributes, and means something else :
And Holy Church under an aspect human
Gabriel and Michael represents to you."
In the beginning of the sixth century, when St. Michael's of Inveresk was founded, churches in Britain had no such aids, but the thoughts suggested by the emblem just described are old as Egyptian hieroglyphics, and are to be found among them. Most probably the first church erected at Inveresk would be of wattle and mud, thatched, possibly with heather.. Bede informs his readers that the church of St. Peter's at York, then the most important of British cities, was built of wood in the seventh century. Stone was not generally used in church building before the tenth or eleventh. The Church of St. Michael's at Inveresk may have been erected earlier. When first mentioned, in the time of Malcolm Canmore,
54 INVERESK PARISH LORE.
the district attached is called Musselburghshire. This is indicative of its antiquity. Shire, in the sense in which "parish" is now employed, was in use for centuries before it came to be applied to an area of civil jurisdiction ; or parish, paroche, parochine, had found a place in our language. So employed, it points to the period of wicker and boulder stone fabrics. That the building demolished in 1803 immediately followed the first church raised, the materials of which it consisted, and the design, appear to suggest. Ample con- current testimony establishes the fact that it was mainly constructed of the materials of the Roman fort which lay conveniently at hand, while its central and earliest part was of a style clearly antecedent to Romanesque. Parallelogram in form, without apsidal annex, its windo\vs small and square, to Norman or Gothic it was not beholden. Like its successor, or St. Clements at Rome, one of the most interesting of all the churches in Christendom, of outward beauty it had little to boast.
Sheriffdoms, in the present meaning of that term were formed in 1305 and Ive de Addeburgh was the first appointed to that of Edinburgh, Haddington and Linlithgow. Malcolm Canmore, by whose charter to Dunfermline " the whole shire of Musselburgi " is conveyed, began to reign in 1056, two centuries and-a-half before. It can thus
ST. MICHAEL'S OF INVERESK. 55
be demonstrated that "shire" in the latter con- nection must have had a different significance than in the former, and that it does not imply a separate seat of a " shirra's " oversight.
By legend, it is seen how early Inveresk became possessed of a Christian church. History follows close upon legend's heels. Bede tells that the gospel was preached in East Lothian in the sixth century, and as the "wattyr" of Esk formed the boundary of Northumbria, from west and east the glad tidings were brought to it. In the seventh century Simeon of Durham gives it this notice : " Et tota terra quse pertinet ad monasterium Sancti Baltheri quoad vocatur Tyningham, a Lambermore, usque ad Escemuthe." Mention is again made of Inveresk when that part of Northumbria which extended from the Tweed to the Firth of Forth became a permanent part of Scotland. When this cession was made in 1020 the fortunes of the " Esclesia de Muskilburg " became linked to those of St. Andrews instead of to Lindisfarne, and the parishioners of Inveresk were thus among the first English speaking subjects of a Scottish king.
In the printed Dunfermline Chartulary, the following translation of Malcolm Canmore's charter annexing Inveresk to Dunfermline appears: — " Autograph —
In the name of the Holy Trinity, I, Malcolm
56 INVERESK PARISH LORE.
by the Grace of God, King of Scots, of my ' royal authority and power, with the confirmation and testimony of Queen Margaret my wife, and of the bishops, earls, and barons of my kingdom, the clergy also and the people acquiesing.
Let all present and future know, that I have founded an abbey on the hill of the infirm in honour of God Almighty, and of the Holy and undivided Trinity, for the safety of iny own soul and of all my ancestors and for the safety of the soul of Queen Margaret my wife, and of all my successors : for I have granted, and by this my Charter confirmed to the foresaid abbey all the lands and towns of Pardasin, Pitnaurcha, Pitte- corthin, Pethachichin, Lawar, Bolgin, and the shire of Kirkaludnt and Inneresc the lesser, with the whole shire of FofrifFe and Musselburge, with all their pertinents, as well in chapels and tithes and other oblations, as in all other things justly belonging to these lands, towns, and shires, as freely as any king ever granted or conveyed any gifts from the beginning of the world to this day. Witnesses, Ivus, Abbot of the Kelledees, MackdufFe, Earl, Duncan, Earl, Arnald, Earl, Neis son of William, Merleswam. At Edinburgh.
Agreeing with the Autograph in all respects, (as added by) Sr Ja. Balfour, Lyone."
At the time when by this Charter Inveresk became subject to Dunfermline, a new era began
ST. MICHAEL'S OF INVERESK. 57
and a new element was introduced into Scottish society. Ecclesiastical buildings became more nu- merous, substantial and stately. The ravages of William the Conqueror in England forced many of the wealthy to seek a refuge in Scotland where they were welcomed by Malcolm and his Queen. Like the Psalmist, Malcolm, a man of war, pre- pared the way for a great work which David, his son, who inherited more of his mother's qualities, carried through.
The liberality of Malcolm and Margaret may be looked at from two stand -points. One view suggests that their benevolence was lavish, im- provident and misapplied, the other sees in it a wise provision to promote the best interests of the people and the true welfare of the nation. To the first estimate Tytler gives a distinct denial, an emphatic no. Malcolm in his opinion did not alienate any considerable portion of crown pro- perty, the extent of which, the personal possession of the Sovereign, he holds to have been far beyond what moderns imagine. The second question, Lord Hailes, a prominent parishioner of Inveresk during Dr. Carlyle's ministry, as effectively replies to. With the native shrewdness for which his lordship was conspicuous, he thus states the case, " We ought to judge of the conduct of men according to the notions of their age, not of ours. To endow monasteries may now be considered as a prodigal
58 INVERESK PARISH LORE.
superstition, but in the days of David it was esteemed an act of pious benevolence. In them the lamp of knowledge continued to burn, how- ever dimly. In them, men of business were formed for the state : the art of writing was cultivated by the monks, they were the only proficients in mechanics, gardening and archi- tecture. When we examine the sites of ancient monasteries we are sometimes inclined to say with the vulgar, that the clergy in former times always chose the best of the land and the most com- modious habitations: but we do not advert that religious houses were frequently erected on waste grounds, afterwards improved by the art and industry of the clergy, who, alone, had art and industry. It was devotion, says John Major, that produced opulence, but the lewd daughter strangled the parent." So writes Lord Hailes of the old churchmen.
The story of the connection between Inveresk and Dunfermline can be traced in outline in a Charter of Confirmation granted by James II., at Edinburgh, 22nd March 1450, and to which the witnesses are " William, bishop of Glasgow, William, Lord Crichton, Lord Chancellor, Andrew, Abbot of Melrose our Confessor and treasurer, William, Lord Somerville. Patrick, Lord Glammis, Masters John Arons, archdeacon of Glasgow, and George of Schoriswode, rector of Culter."
ST. MICHAEL'S OF INVERESK. 59
In the narration with which this deed begins, King James sets forth among other reasons which prompted him to grant it that, in the abbey of Dunfermline " many of the bodies of our ancestors, kings of the Scots, lie most honourably entombed," and his solicitude that " the tranquility, peace and freedom of the said monastery may be secured and that it may not hereafter be harassed by the disturbing influence of any fluctuating affairs, but enjoy its possessions as we earnestly desire, in quiet and perpetual prosperity." The charter is too lengthy to be here given in full, but the following provisions bear upon Inveresk in its relationship to Dunfermline. The gift of Malcolm is first confirmed, then that of Hailes, conveyed by Ethelred ; next those of the most excellent David the First," among the long list of which appears " the greater Inveresk, the harbour mill and fish- ing, and Carbarrin, (Carberry,) and the Church of Inveresk ; " express exemption is given from poinding of all belonging to the monastery, — its men and cattle being particularly mentioned, — from payment of any toll throughout Scotland, which would imply freedom from burgh maills or custom; from working at bridges, castles and all other works, thus relieving those connected with the monastery from an obligation to which all others were subject and which until recent years passed by the name of Statute Labour. From King
60 INVERESK PARISH LORE.
William the Abbey received a donation of one hundred shillings annually out of the revenue of the burgh of Edinburgh, which he gave on the day of his brother King Malcolm's burial. In the accounts of the rental derived from Mussel- burghshire in 1561 the payment of this £5 appears. The lands of Smeaton (Smithton) near Musselburgh were the gift of Alexander II. and the great custom leviable at Musselburgh, Robert I. con- veyed to the Abbey.
Papal Bulls confirmatory of what David I. had done were issued by Lucius III. in 1182 and by Gregory IX. in 1234. The latter grants right to levy toll for the repair of bridge and streets.
How important the parish must have been regarded is to be gathered from the contribution it was called upon to pay to St. Andrews in 1176 according to the ancient Taxatio. The following is the list, Ecclesia de Muskilburg 70 mercas : ditto de Cranstoun, 60 : ditto de Creichton, 30 : ditto de Faulau, 6 : ditto de Locherwort, 40 : ditto de Kerynton, 18 : ditto de Kochpen, 20 : ditto de Clerkington, 8 : ditto de Maisterton, 4 : ditto de Heriot, 30 : ditto de Monte Laoedoniae, 12.
An entry of another kind occurs in 1198. Robert de Berwick was then Abbot of Dunfermline. Simon Stury, a burgess of Musselburgh, obtained an acre of land in feu on the north side of the Esk, the payment for which was stipulated to be
ST. MICHAEL'S OF INVERESK. 61
paid at the feast of the nativity of John the Baptist.
Three years after this charter was granted to Simon, Musselburgh witnessed a great gathering of Scottish nobility. William the Lion had a son born at Haddington, 24th August 1198, and to swear allegiance to this little boy they were summoned here. Wynton gives the following quaint description of the occasion : —
The tothir yhere next folowand The mychfcy Lordys of Scotland The athe swore off thare fewte At Muskilbruch beside the se Till Alysandyr Willamy's swne, His fadyrs days were nocht all dwne, Bot his fadyr, the King Wyllame In all hys state and in hys name Efftyre that wes King regnand In till the kynrik off Scotland."
This William was called " the Lion " because he placed " the ruddy lion ramp'd in gold " upon his banner, an emblem that ever since has held its place upon the royal shield, and never has ceased to call forth Scottish patriotism.
Says Burns; —
' ' Wild beats my heart to trace your steps, Whose ancestors in days of yore Through hostile ranks and ruin'd gaps Old Scotia's bloody lion bore."
In the spring of 1242, David de Bernham,
62 INVERESK PARISH LORE.
bishop of St. Andrews, one of the best prelates Scotland ever had, called together his clergy and held a diocesan synod at Musselburgh. Alpheus Bellesheim, canon of Aix la Chapelle, in his History of the Catholic Church of Scotland fur- nishes particulars regarding this meeting. Dr. Rankin, author of the Hand-book of the Church of Scotland also notices it. The business transacted was of the very highest moment for the well-being of the church, and the excellent spirit which guided the deliberations of those assembled may be gathered from the drift of the decrees agreed upon. Yet we look in vain in the pages of most historians for any notice whatever of this synod. The decrees passed were twenty-six in number. The first enjoined that church-yards be properly fenced to protect them against wild animals, which at that time were numerous in the forests that covered a great part of the country. The maintenance of church buildings in repair was laid down to be a sacred duty, and the rector of each parish was called upon to provide a silver chalice Jind other requisites. The clergy were required to wear a distinguishing dress, not to frequent taverns unless when on a journey, not to gamble, to be pure and circumspect, and to reside in their parishes. Sacramental wine was ordered to be Red in preference to White, and directions were given as to the administration of
ST. MICHAEL'S OF INVERESK. 63
Communion, Extreme Unction and Marriage. Ex- treme Unction was ordered to be repeated when circumstances so required, and no marriage was to be celebrated except after due proclamation of banns and then only in presence of witnesses. Prayer was to be made for the Royal Family, the Church and those in authority, and sundry other provisions were made designed to promote Religion, spiritual consolation for the sick, and that Christian burial might be accorded to those over- taken by sudden death. Finally that these decrees might become a power for good, their publication in every parish church was made imperative, and, their observance was strictly enjoined.
Fancy pictures the scene St. Michael's presented when this synodical meeting took place. Its fabric yet unharmed by the tooth of Time, its area un- encumbered by pews, its floor echoes the procession of priests, its roof resounds with music, its air is fragrant with incense, and its eager occupants await their work. What that Synod did, affords an insight into these old times, and shows their churchmen to have been fervent, devout, and pious. Where worship is still offered was con- secrated by their service and hallowed by what they accomplished. To imagination,
"The organ sounds, and unseen choirs
Sing the old Latin hymns of peace and love, And benedictions of the Holy Ghost."
64 INVERESK PARISH LORE.
So early as 669 they began to learn Sacred music in all the churches of the English, and Eddi surnamed Stephen was engaged as first singing master for the churches in Northumbria. Of these Inveresk, it is to be remembered, was one.
De Bernham may be regarded at once as a most capable administrator and a reformer before the Reformation. These decrees prove him to have had an open eye upon abuses, and an earnest purpose to further all that he deemed desirable. Scotland has never wanted instances of perverted zeal and of Scripture teaching misapplied. Before De Bernham's day there were of the clergy who had ceased to celebrate the Communion of the Lord's Supper. " We are sinners," said they, " and therefore dread to communicate unworthily." After six centuries and a-half the same faithless superstition not only lingers, but largely prevails, among the laity, especially in the north. Hence the value a right understanding as to the Saviour's dying command "This do in remembrance of me," must have had in De Bernham's time. But, that bishop has also left behind a wonderful record of diligence in duty, of which the evidence is happily furnished by his own pen. In less than ten years he consecrated no fewer than one hundred and forty-two churches. This at first appears an astounding proof of zeal in church
MII.E
o* 'PAkisu ACCOUNT-BOOK, 1655.
64 »RE.
to leant Sacred
the churches of the English, find
••named • was engaged ju- first
.-!<;• master for the churches in Northumbrin.
hese Inveresk, it is to b<- red, vv.v-
one. .
De Bernham may be regarded at <K. most capable administrator and a refonuer the Reformation. These decrees prove him to have had an open eye .upon abfcses, and an earnest purpose to further all that he deemed desirabk. m v »• v ^nf'fp of perverted
tittfri they,
: . i v xi u wor tlii ly . ' '
the same faithless
>-•- nut •• ,^-s, but largely prevails,
- laity, et|»^CM:illy in the north. Hence
utuierstanding aft to the Saviour's
•uim.'Hiil " This do in remembrance of
i.st have had in De Bernhrvm's time.
bishop has also left behmd a wonderful
r««rji ;^ence in duty, of wlm?5 th< evidence
i-. h»^ p.iy furnished by his OWL t-^n. In less
thaa ^.'O >>«»rR he consecrated uo t^-wtf than one
huini>v4 «t«-i forty-two churches. This at first
adin£j proof of sfcaJ in church
FACSIMILE HALF-PAGE OF PARISH AccouisTT-BooK, 1655.
ST. MICHAEL'S OF INVERESK. 65
building. But it is scarcely that. Rather, it is in keeping with the business disposed of at the Synod of Musselburgh, to have " all things done decently and in order," as the Apostle directs. Negligence to the rule which required church and churchyard to be consecrated, so that the one might be regarded as " The Lord's House," and the other "God's acre," had become largely pre- valent, and no prelate appears to have set himself with so much assiduity to bring all within his jurisdiction to a sense of duty in this respect as he of St. Andrews. Curiously enough the pontificial offices De Bernham used when engaged in the various consecration services in which he took the prominent part has, within the last few years, been discovered in the National Library of France at Paris. On a blank leaf in it he had jotted down where and when these services were conducted, and thus is learned how busy a life he must have led. It is noteworthy that in this precious itinerary of one branch of his labours no entry of a dedication service at Inveresk appears. This, then, clearly shows St. Michael's there must have been already consecrated. St. Cuthbert's, " under the castle," Edinburgh, he dedicated on 6th March 1242, apparently after the Musselburgh meeting, and St. Giles not until 6th October of the following year. This remark- able prelate ruled over an extensive area, from the E
66 INVERESK PARISH LORE.
Scottish border-land on the south-east to the neighbourhood of Aberdeen ; and the meeting over which he presided at Musselburgh was the first provincial council held in Scotland under the authority of the Pope.
VIL
TIME OF WALLACE AND BRUCE.
"N the period of Wallace and Bruce several of the scattered threads of the parish story are found. By the untimely death of Alexander III., near Kinghorn 1286, the suc- cession to the Scottish crown devolved upon the Maid of Norway, and the death of that princess in her eighth year plunged the country into the troubles that a disputed contest for the throne brings. Among the competitors, Robert De Pinkeny appears. He claimed to be of royal lineage, but did not press his suit. That de Pinkeny means of Pinkie seems more than pro- bable. In the process of development to its present form it may be found in one charter as Pontekin, in another of 1531 between the monks of Dunfermline and those of Newbattle it is Pinckin, while in the Annuell of Mussil- burghe-schyre, 1561, it appears Pynkin. It is noteworthy that all that is required to bring Pynkeny into harmony with the present pro- 67
68 INVEUESK PARISH LORE.
nounciation of Pinkie is the omission of its second last letter n, a strong proof of their identity. But a far more important figure than Eobert de Pinkeny in the nation's annals, Sir William Wallace, once made Musselburgh his rendezvous. Resolved to punish the Earl of Dunbar for his treachery to the cause of Scottish independence, Wallace gathered to his side a couple of hundred of intrepid followers upon the Figgate Muir between Leith and the Honest Toun, 1290, and this brave band with Wallace at its head made Market Gate and Old Bridge resound with the hoofs of their horses as they pranced forward to meet Robert Lauder and Crystal Seton with their retainers at Mussel- burgh.
At Innerwick the patriot band encountered the traitor Earl, routed his force, and captured his stronghold, the castle of Dunbar.
About this period the pinch of famine was often felt, and many perished, while it was not uncom- mon for the poor to be driven to eat grass, so hard were they beset.
In 1363 Thomas Fawside, knight, is mentioned as among those who took part in a convention or parliament, which was held at Inchmartin, another instance of the important place the lairds of that ilk took in national affairs. From another of its knights, Orme, Ormiston takes its name.
TIME OF WALLACE AND BRUCE. 69
As a specimen of an old Scottish manor house Pinkie deservedly holds a foremost place. Near its north-west corner is a massive tower in the style of a feudal keep. This, built by the Abbot of Dun- fermline in 1390, for more than a couple of centuries was Pinkie, and up till the Reformation it was used by the Abbots as a country residence.
Few readers of Scott's " Tales of a Grandfather " will forget Binnock, the farmer- waggoner, whose ingenious strategem enabled Douglas to wrest the castle of Linlithgow from an English garrison 1311. This Binnock's successors settled in Inveresk, and became known as the Binnings of Wallyford. Lord Binning, a senator of the College of Justice, built Wallyford House towards the close of the seven- teenth century. The family figure in parish and burgh records.
In the Register of Dunfermline Abbey a charter of manumission is recorded, whereby a number of slaves attached to the manor of Carberry were raised to the rank of freemen in 1313, on the con- dition that the Abbacy was to receive from them a two-year-old ox, or four shillings, yearly. This deed applied not only to the parents but to their children. When David I. gifted the manor, the tillers of the soil, according to the custom of the time, were conveyed with it, and became as much the property of the Abbey as anything else upon the land. Careful account of these bondsmen was
70 INVERESK PARISH LORE.
kept, and only by such a deed as just mentioned could they or their posterity acquire freedom. From notices of this degraded class met with in the Dunfermline Chartulary, it appears many were the descendants of the subjugated Britons. From the frequency with which " Gille " forms a prefix to their uneuphonious names, and its significance, U servant, it is seen whence our modern " Highland ghillie " comes. Throughout the whole of the thirteenth and fourteenth centuries this condition .of bondage was predominant. The names applied to farm labourers — nativi, servi, villani, homines, fugitivi, bondi, mancipii — sufficiently indicate their servile and helpless estate. The ranks of these bondsmen received a large increase in the time of William the Conqueror. Driven to despair by the sword, fire, and famine, so many fled into Scotland and gave themselves up to a life of servitude for the sake of obtaining a miserable subsistence that, for long, there were thousands of English slaves scattered among the towns and hamlets of the north.
On the afternoon of the 24th June 1314 a sad but welcome sight must have been witnessed at Musselburgh. A little band, on foam-flecked steeds, spurring on at topmost speed, rattled over the causeway of the Market Gate, hurried across the Auld Brig, and dashed along the great highway for the south. Who were these knightly warriors ?
TIME OF WALLACE AND BRUCE. 71
Fugitives from Bannockburn ! Proud Edward and his scanty guard, hotly pursued, riding for life and liberty, the unwilling bearers of the news of Bruce's victory.
Eight years afterwards, Scotland was threatened with another visit from the English thirsting for revenge, but Bruce once more checkmated them and Edward had to return thwarted. Bruce di- rected all moveables to be cleared away from Lothian, and Lord Hailes relates that so well were his orders obeyed that the only plunder the English army obtained was a lame bull found at Tranent. The expedition proved a failure because supplies could not be obtained, which was exactly what The Bruce desired. On the death of Bruce in 1329, his nephew, Randolph, Earl of Moray, who had been second in command at Bannockburn, became Regent of Scotland and tutor and guardian of the young king. In the roll of the barons of Scotland 1289, Thomas Randolf, Abbe of Dunfermline is placed third on the list of Abbots, and they have precedence given them next after Contes, i.e., Counts, a title long since unknown in the British peerage. The administration of Randolph must ever be regarded as a bright period in Scottish history. By it is displayed high statesmanship, unbending integrity, lofty patriotism, fearless discharge of duty, and a wise concern for the public good. Randolph despatched Roger of Fawside, a heritor
72 INVERESK PARISH LORE.
of Inveresk, in 1330, as Ambassador to the Court of Edward, to negotiate a treaty of amity between the two nations, a task in which the laird of Faw- side was successful. Here it may be explained that the old fortalice of Fawside Castle is outside the boundary of Inveresk, but its home farm or grange is within that line.
Two years after the treaty had been ratified Randolph was taken ill, when on a journey, about a mile eastward from Musselburgh. He had long suffered much from stone, but had borne the pain it occasioned with great fortitude. Brought back to the burgh, the best lodging the town afforded was placed at his service. It was a one storey two-roomed house with vaulted ceilings, and its site is now occupied by the dwelling at the south-east extremity of High Street, next to St. Peter's Episcopal Church. A ground plan and elevation of Randolph's lodging are given in the original Statistical Account of the parish. The house remained in the same state until the present century.
The late Sir John David Hope informed the writer that his father was most anxious to have so precious a relic preserved, but the proprietors between 1820 and 1830, proceeded to modernize and convert it into a two storey house. Sub- sequently it was purchased by Sir Archibald Hope, when a portion of the back wall was ascertained
TIME OF WALLACE AND BRUCE. 73
to be part of the original structure. During the continuance of Randolph's illness, the magistrates shewed their illustrious guest every attention in their power, and the burgesses in the discharge of their obligation to "watch and ward," did duty over his residence as a guard of honour. When the Earl of Mar, who succeeded Randolph, heard of these attentions he is said to have remarked " they are a set of honest fellows," and it is from this circumstance the Town's motto, " Honestas," was obtained. The Earl also secured to the burgh the right to collect certain customs which it en- joyed till such tolls were abolished, and roads and bridges were made chargeable upon ratepayers.
In the Register of Dunfermline we get another glimpse of the condition of society in the old burgh circa, 1340. Alexander de Ber, the same Abbot whom we have seen issue a charter of manumis- sion, feus seven acres of land to a " burgens de Musselburgo," Simon Sturdy by name, and his wife Alicia, the situation of which is thus described : " Jacent inter aquam de Esk, ex occidentali porte vice se extendentem de burgo de Muscilburg, verus Nidreth." Here we see the Abbot's dealings, on the one hand with the poor slave, and on the other with the well-to-do freeman burgess. By this latter little business transaction we are reminded how much the cause of freedom, of progress and of prosperity has been nursed and promoted by the.
74 INVERESK PARISH LORE.
townsmen of the past, by their corporations and by their guilds. In these can be read " the nobility of labour, the long pedigree of toil."
On 24th October 1354 a charter was granted to the Burgh of Musselburgh by King David II. All the rights and privileges it had previously enjoyed as a burgh of regality holding of the Abbey of Dunfermline were by it anew ratified and confirmed.
In the depth of the winter 1355-6, the parish experienced the horrors of a state of war. Baliol had surrendered his crown and become the pen- sioner of Edward III. ; and Scotland betrayed had to bear arms once more. David II. had been weak enough to acknowledge Edward's claims, but the proud spirit of his subjects would not brook sub- mission. The result was Edward marched into Scotland with an army 3,000 strong, splendidly equipped. David's advisers counselled to follow Bruce's plan, and so the line of march was stripped of all that could avail the invaders. Advancing through Berwickshire into Lothian, every town and village Edward's soldiers reached were given to the flames. He made a halt of ten days- at Haddington, and wantonly wrecked the Lamp of Lothian, the adjoining monastery and the town. From Haddington this mighty host proceeded by Musselburgh to Leith ; and the mention of " Burnt Candlemas " in many a Scottish home long after-
TIME OF WALLACE AND BRUCE. 75
wards reminded of the havoc which it wrought and the misery which it caused.
Devastation from a very different agency was experienced in the district on the second Christmas Eve following Burnt Candlemas. The season had been unpropitious, the harvest was ungathered and the sodden grain still in stook. Owing to the terrible rain-fall the rivers became swollen, and lamentable destruction was the result.
To the fifteenth century the introduction of the now exceedingly popular game of golf into Scot- land is attributed. Dr. Carlyle considered it probably to have been an adaption from the Dutch game of Kolf. It is to be remembered intercourse between Holland and Scotland came at that period to be very friendly. The herring shoals had deserted their old haunts and had found their way to the British Coasts. The maritime instincts of the Dutch, and improvements they had introduced into the process of curing, naturally sent them in pursuit of the harvest of the sea, and it became their interest to keep in the good graces of those upon the shores where they plied their calling. It is perhaps hardly so well known as it deserves to be that the prosperity of Holland owes not a little to its trade in salt herrings, at a time when cured fish were in universal request as food upon the fast days enjoined by the Church.
To the Firth of Forth Dutch luggers accordingly
76 IXVEKESK PARISH LORE.
came, and a brisk trade sprung up with Mussel- burgh. Evidence of it is still patent to everybody in the " knockhous " and clock of the Honest Toun. That clock, — and most probably the knockJunw too, — like the essential wooden case of an old-fashioned eight-day clock, — was the gift of the Dutch States, and the thrifty Hollanders had doubtless a sense of self-interest, combined with gratitude for favours received, in making so handsome a present. The clock bears the date 1496, thus goes back for a century and a-half before the general introduction of the pendulum, and after four centuries of tear and wear continues to mark-time with commend- able regularity. Its old face plates were replaced in 1883 with transparent dials, the gift of Mr. Frederick Ritchie of Messrs. James Ritchie & Son, Edinburgh. To return to the introduction of the game of golf, this national pastime was severely frowned upon in high quarters, but to little pur- pose. Those who imagine a people's pleasures can be controlled by Act of Parliament and changed into other currents, might find it worth while to study how powerless it proved in dealing with golf, a recreation to which leading parliamentarians now betake themselves. In the parish of Inveresk and upon the links of Musselburgh golf has been played from time immemorial, and it cannot be doubted enactments aimed at the game had its practice at this place in view. As examples of this
TIME OF WALLACE AND BRUCE. 77
futile legislation take the following : — In 1547 it was statute and ordained by James II. that " the fute ball and golfe be utterlie cryed doun and not to be used and that the bowe marke be maid at ilk paroch kirk, a pair of buttes and schutting be used. And that ilk man shutte sex shottes at the least, under the paine to be raised upon them that cummis not, at the least twa pennies to be given to them that cummis to the bowe markes to drink. And this to be used fra Pasche till Alhallowmes after, and be the nixt Midsommer to be ready with all their grnith without failzie.
" And as tutching the fute ball and the golfe to be punished with the baronnis un-law, and gif he talus not the un-law, that it be taken be the kingis officiares ; and if the parochine be rneikle, that there be three or foure bowe markis in sik places as gainis therefore, and that all men that is within fiftie and past twelve zeires sail use schutting." " 1491. Item. ' in na place of the realm there be used fute ball, golfe, or ither sik unprofitable sports, for the common gude of the realme and defense thereof.' "
Yet in spite of all this golf held its own till it came to be patronised and practised by royalty. A closing backward glance to the fifteenth century shows how some church endowments originated. The Prestons of Craigmillar were long landlords in Inveresk. Sir Simon, the laird, in 1476 burdened
78 INVERESK PARISH LORE.
his lands of Cameron with an annual rent of ten inerks for the maintenance of a priest to minister at one of the altars in St. Michael's Church, and in doing that he did no more than churchmen and dissenters do still when they contribute for church objects.
VIII.
DAWN OF THE REFORMATION.
"N the Parliamentary Records an entry occurs, shewing that even bailies had their actions sometimes over-ruled in olden times. On 23rd March 1503-4, so reads the record 'a cause was served in Parliament against William Froge and George Hill the bailies of Musselburgh, for their misconduct in serving several writs of inquest which had issued from the Chapel (the chancery) of the Abbot of Dunfermline on a tenement in that town. The lords found that the inquest had erred in serving the writ and set aside the re tour.' Such a verdict must have been appalling to their honours, and have appeared to be subversive of all municipal authority. Before Reform turned the world topsy-turvy, Bailies were Bailies and their dictum was decisive, even though it should be like his of the Canongate who maintained that a squirrel had wings, or his of Musselburgh who told an accused 'if ye hadna' a pig ye micht hae had yin, an' ye maun gist pay the fine — half- a crown.' A worthy specimen of a Musselburgh magistrate who flourished among the twenties re- 79
80 1NVERESK PARISH LORE.
garded the province of parliament to be to back the bailie. A tenement was about to be rebuilt in High Street, but an adjoining proprietor threatened to hinder the work by putting forward a claim which he could not substantiate. The point was placed before the Town Council who met on the spot and heard parties. This done, the bailie called upon the mason employed and loftily com- manded him, ' Go ! build that house to the skies by my orders.' ' No sae fast ye're honour,' blurted out the obstructionist, 'I'll apply tae the Sheriff for an interdic.' ' What do you say, sir ? thundered his honour, ' say another word and I'll get an act of parliament and take your house from you.'
Provost Lawrie was a more recent example of the same type. He was supremely impressed with the importance of his position. When first elected to a bailieship, in descending the Council House stair he encountered the Inspector of Police. " I'm a magistrate, sir," quoth Bailie Lawrie. Giving the official salute, Mr. Baird replied, " I am pleased to hear it sir." " Do you know sir, what would have happened sir, had I not been made a magis- trate ?" Poor Mr. Baird had to confess he could not divine. "Why, sir, there would have been a resignation, there would have been a demonstration, there would have been a presentation, there would have been a denunciation," and thus relieved, off the newly-fledged bailie marched stamping his
KKV. ADAM
bo be to back
A N i IMJ rebuilt in
'•t: > uf r thmitened
r th*- vs H claim
u he '•• '.!• : not substtti:' •f>d U't^fr-. the Town C spot >MH.i heard parties. This don callt -1 upon the mason employed and loftily manded him, ' Go ! build that house to the skies by my orders.' ' No sae fast ye're honour,' blurted out the obstructionist, 'I'll apply t&o the Sheriff for an mterdic.' ' What, do you say. his honour, 'ft»y another i of r;
. tht> Council ! .spector of Police. " I'm , Bailio Lawrie. Giving Mr. Baiixl i-eplied, "I am pleased sir." " I)o you know sir, what would' OIK --d sir, had I not been made a magis- .' or Mr. Baiixi had to cont'«?S8 he cpuld " Why, sir, there would b^ve been a .11, there would have been a d».-n»«'»iwttration, '•.Id have been a presentflt-km, th« ve would •• a denunciation," and thu* relumed, oft' ••lired bailie rnarchwl viAining his
REV. ADAM COLT, M.A.
DAWN OF THE REFORMATION. 81
vstaff upon the pavement. But the Provost's self- elation sometimes had to submit to be eclipsed. A close of small dwelling-houses were required to be added to the dormitory accommodation of a private lunatic asylum of which Provost Lawrie was the medical officer. It was necessary that the Sheriff of the County should first inspect and pass them, and for this purpose he visited the premises accompanied by the Provost. Uncere- moniously entering one of the houses tenanted by Beannie Moodie, a washer-woman, and who was busy among her soap-suds, the Provost announced, " this is the Sheriff, Mrs. Moodie, come to look at your house," but the good lady did not relish being caught in confusion and tartly rejoined, " I dinna care a spit, for either you or the Shirra. I s'pose, Provost, if I had come to your hoose I'd had to knock at the door an ax if it was con- venient!" <; You're quite right my good woman," gently put in Sheriff Gordon, " we have been very rude coming in without asking leave, we will come back some other day." " Na ! na ! Shirra, come in and look at the hoose, but I wus'na pleased wi' the wey the Provost cam' in," and so Beannie had the better of it with the Provost, for "didna the Shirra side wi' her."
Of much repute in the sixteenth century, the Chapel of our Lady of Loretto became famous as a place of pilgrimage. It was situated at the F
82 INVERESK PARISH LORE.
east end of the High Street of Musselburgh be- tween a portion of the town's common and the mill lade. The hermit who established himself here about 1533 obtained a petri or piece of stoney ground for the erection of his chapel in honour of God and the Virgin Mary of Loretto. Thomas Duthie or Douchtie, we learn, to have been the name of this hermit of the order of St. Paul's. A charter of James V., 1534, confirms the feu he had obtained, and in the " Diurnal of Remarkable Occurrents" the following reference to him is made: — In this menc tyme thair come ane heremeit, callit Thomas Douchtie, in Scotland, quha haid bein lang capitane befoir the Turk, as was allegit, and brocht ane ymage of our Lady with him, and foundit the chappel of the Laureit, besyid Musselburgh." Paterson, the historian of the Regality, thinks it highly probable this Douchtie may have been a native of the burgh from the name occurring in precepts of infeftment. This chapel and its hermit attracted large numbers. Bishop Leslie gives an account of a pilgrimage made to it by James V. on foot from Stirling Castle to beseech the aid of the Virgin in his love making. The example of the king many fol- lowed, but the early reputation of the shrine became exchanged for scenes of revelry, and pil- grimages were made occasions of sinful indulgence. Lindsay gives a painful picture of departed sane-
DAWN OF THE REFORMATION. 83
tity in the references he has to what happened there. Along with part of the town the chapel was burned by Hereford in 1544, but it was speedily repaired and witnessed the last attempt at miracle working in Scotland in 1558. The prin- ciples of the Reformation had been already sown. Wishart preached in St. Michael's of Inveresk in 1546, guarded by an armed escort of the retainers of the lairds of Brunstane, Ormiston and Long- niddry. Shortly thereafter he was captured at Ormiston Hall, carried to St. Andrews and suffered martyrdom.
IX.
REFORMATION PERIOD.
T the Reformation the paroche of Inneresk and Muscilburg, that is the parish of Inveresk, was not as now included in the Presbytery of Dalkeith but formed part of the Metropolitan Presbytery. The Rev. John Burne was its minister in 1562. His stipend in 1567 was 200 merks equal to £11, 2s. 2d. sterling. A glebe was designed for him by Mr. John Spottiswood, superintendent of Lothian, consisting of " four aikers of land, whilk he possessit twa years after his entrie." His residence was doubtless the old vicarage, for the cure of St. Michael's had pre- viously been held by vicars— and the vicarage is understood to have occupied a position very near the situation of the present manse, in evidence of which one of its adjuncts, the vicar's well, remained in Dambrae, and its water was in much request till a few years ago, when its use was forbidden and its site enclosed from sanitary considerations. References to the glebe occur in Session Records and point out its situation. These are noticed later. After every reasonable allowance is made for the
84
REFORMATION PERIOD. 85
vastly greater purchasing power of money in Mr. Burne's time, the inadequacy of the stipend he received to maintain a minister and his family in comfort is only too apparent. Nor was the case of Inveresk exceptional, all throughout Scotland the same difficulty prevailed. In this way the clergy were pinched that courtiers might profit ; but as it happened in this instance it was done at the cost of undermining that mutual love between husband and wife without which domestic happiness is im- possible, even in a palace. James VI. the morning after his marriage made over the church manors at Inveresk as part of the queen's dowry, but he had also handed these over to Chancellor Maitland when high in court favour. In spite of all en- treaties to get the latter gift revoked, Her Majesty's marital rights were disregarded, and the Chancellor retained possession. The Earls of Lauderdale, descended from Maitland, from this came to hold the superiority of Musselburgh and the right of presentation to Inveresk. To this same chancellor Presbyterian Scotland is mainly indebted for the Act of 1592, which is still re- garded as the Maoma Charta of the Church of the
O O
Reformation.
It is remarkable that Mr. Burne's ministry should find no place in either of the Statistical Accounts of the parish, in the History of the Regality, nor in Gazetteer articles. This shews
86 INVERESK PARISH LORE.
the inestimable value of the publication of authentic records to the cause of historical accuracy and ful- ness, and the great service which such societies as the Bannatyne and Maitland Clubs are capable of rendering. From the Register which furnishes particulars relative to the first Reformation minis- ter of Inveresk, it appears that ministers' stipends were then paid at Beltym
Next in succession to Mr. John Burne was the Rev. Andrew Blackball in 1574. From the Register of Ministers and their stipends sen the Yeir of God 1567 he is found to have been, previous to his induction, minister of Ormistoun, Crankstoun, and Pencaitlen, with a stipend of jc lib. The Assignations of ministers' stipends for the year Io76 has this entry: — "Inveresk. Maister Andro Blakhall, minister, his stipend jc xxvj lib. xiij3 iiijcl to be payit as follows, viz. : his awin vicarage of Cranstoun newly disponit to him xxvj lib. xiij8 iiijd and out of the third of Dunfermling jc lib. Edward Leyns, reidare at Inveresk, his stipend xx lib. to be payit out of the third of Dunfermling be the taxmen or parochiners of Inveresk." After coming to Inveresk Mr. Black- hall had Newton and Cranston parishes also under his charge. He was a Commissioner of a province, and at the Assembly of 1580 was accused of admit- ting an unqualified exhorter to discharge sacred functions, but the finding is not stated. Mr.
REFORMATION PERIOD. 87
Blackball and his son, Andrew, had confirmation granted to them by the king, 22 July 1582, of a pension of xl. lib. yearly, made by the Com- mendator and Convent of Haliecroce beside Edin- burgh, " from the twa part of the teind scheaves of Falkirk." This pension was converted later into a gift, and was excepted from confiscation when Par- liament dealt with the temporalities of the Church, June 1594. Such tenderness of dealing would appear to indicate some special claim that Mr. Blackball had upon the convent, and that he was one of those who formed connecting links between " the old order and the new." Many of the early ministers of the Reformed Church are believed to have been priests whose accession to the ranks of the Reformers enabled parishes to be equipped with an educated ministry to an extent otherwise impossible.
The year 1584 was one of much misery and con- fusion in Scotland. The king was determined to supplant Presbyterian order in the Church, and aimed at obtaining possession of absolute power. Dismay spread through the ranks of the Presby- terians, and great activity was manifested to accomplish the royal purpose. Cousland, Dirleton, and Newton estates, south, east, and west of Inver- esk, were confiscated for opposition to the king's wishes, and the minister of Inveresk was sum- moned before the Privy ' Council to answer for
88 INVERESK PARISH LORE.
refusing to acknowledge the royal supremacy in spiritual as well as temporal concerns. He appears to have escaped, however, from deprivation of office, as two years later he was appointed by the Assembly one of the Commissioners for trying the offences of the ministry in Lothian. In that year also, 1586, the Lords of the Exchequer ordained Mr. David Lindsay, Commissioner of Lothian, to design " a glebe of three aikers nearest the kirk."
Mr. Blackball was a member of the Assembly in December 1606, which agreed to constant Modera- tors, and named such for the different presbyteries. He died 31st January 1609 in his seventy-third year, and the stone erected to his memory may be seen in the wall of the church on west side of the spire within the ministers' burying-ground. For a considerable period towards the close of his ministry, Mr. Blackball must have been unable fully to discharge his parochial duties unaided, nor need this be wondered at. As helper to him the Rev. Philip Hislop, A.M., a late Regent in the University of Edinburgh, was called in November 1593 and entered upon the office 1st January 1595, but died in the following year. Mr. Adam Colt, who succeeded, was admitted to the charge nine years before Mr. Black hall's death.
During the incumbencies of Mr. Burne and Mr. Blackball, the constitution, order, and government of the Church were in the main settled. One step
REFORMATION PERIOD. 89
towards this may be noticed. Till the Reforma- tion Inveresk was included in the Archdeanery of Lothian, called the " Archdeanery of St. Andrews besouth Forth," but in 1581 a group of adjacent parishes including it was formed into the Presby- tery of Edinburgh — the first of its kind in the kingdom. Others in due course followed, and those constituted in 1586 received royal recogni- tion. The work of organisation went on ; presby- teries were acknowledged as Courts of the Church ; and the whole of Scotland was mapped out in this manner. In giving effect to this localization scheme the General Assembly, in July 1591, dis- joined Inveresk from the Presbytery of Edinburgh and attached it to that of Dalkeith, in which it was enrolled 28 October following. So one of Scotland's most ancient parishes was deprived of its rightful place in her oldest Presbytery.
X.
MINISTRY OF MR. ADAM COLT.
[HE third holder of the incumbency after the |[g) Reformation was a man of mark, and an able, diligent, and dignified minister. Mr. Adam Colt was appointed to the charge at the time when the Chancellor of Scotland, Alexander Seton, Lord Dunfermline, had one of his residences at Pinkie, and more than any other of the ministers of the parish he was brought into close contact and frequent conflict with the reigning sovereign in times of difficulty and danger. If, as a recent historian says of James VI., "an immortality of mischief seems to have been conferred on this foolish king," and if he were "the wisest fool in Christendom," as another has it, the position of Mr. Colt was one which required the exercise of much discretion and rare firmness.
Mr. Adam Colt was born in Perth in 1562, and was the son of a worthy elder and respected magistrate of the Fair City. His family was of good position, possessed considerable social and Court influence, and as his descendants have been 90
MINISTRY OF MR. ADAM COLT. 91
connected with the parish onwards to the present generation, something of his family history may here be introduced.
During the fourteenth, fifteenth, and sixteenth centuries many of the name of Colt appear to have resided in Perthshire and the neighbouring counties, but it is claimed that a settlement had been effected in Scotland by the family at a much earlier period, and that they are descended from Colpach (i.e. Gaelic for " the Colt,") chief of a powerful clan as far back as the ninth century. Whether the place-name Corpach, at the southern extremity of the Caledonian Canal, is a corruption of Colpach we have been unable to ascertain, but it seems by no means improbable. Many other place-names in abundance show how widespread and influential members of the family must have been in early times ; and charters and other records only add confirmation. For example, John de Colt had a charter, apud Sconem 12 Feb. 1228. Colt, or Cults in Aberdeenshire was originally held by John de Colt, and remained in his family till 1390, when it was conveyed by Catherine Colt to her husband, Sir John Forbes. Coltbridge, on the west of Edinburgh, in the reign of David II. belonged to lohes, otherwise John de Colt, who married Beatrice de Lestalrik (Beatrice of Restal- rig) ; and East and West Coates are unquestionably other local renderings of the family name.
92 INVERESK PARISH LORE.
The father of the Rev. Adam Colt of Inveresk was Blaise Colt, who inherited among other heri- tages the property of Leonardley, Perth, and which now, as near as may be, forms the present parish of St. Leonard's. Mr. Blaise Colt's signature as a magistrate appears, along with that of King James, who was at one time provost of the city, in the Perth burgh records. Mr. Adam Colt's mother was Geils (Egidia) Fleming, and through her he became related to Lord Chancellor Maitland, a relationship which gave him a powerful friend in high places.
Adam, destired to become minister of Inveresk and ancestor of the Colts of Inveresk and Gart- sherrie, was the seventh and youngest son of this worthy couple. He received his education at Perth and St. Andrews. He entered St. Salvator's College in his eighteenth year, and became M.A. three years afterwards. When only twenty-four he was elected one of the Regents of Edinburgh University, then called King James the Sixth's College, and among his students he had the future Sir Thomas Hope of Craighall, afterwards a liberal contributor to the building and funds of the college. In Crawford's history of the college, the following account of Mr. Colt's election is given: — "In the year 1586, five years after the original foundation of the University (the fear of the plague being removed,) the Maisters and Students of the College
MINISTRY OF MR. ADAM COLT. 93
returned and prosecuted their courses. In the beginning of October, Mr. Charles Lumisden de- mitting, and it being thought fit that ane third class should begin, Programmes were set forth to invite able spirits to give tryal for two Regent's places. After public dispute for tenne days be six young men, ye Judges appoynted be ye Provost and Counsall declarit Mr. Adanie Colt to bee best qualified for ye Profession of Philosophic (the other disputants were honourably rewarded for their paines.)
" In 1588 Mr. Adame Colte's classe being the second initiate be Mr. Duncan Name (Nairne) continued be Mr. Charles Lumisden to the end of the second year, was graduate in August, being about the number of 30.
"On the 4th August 1591, Mr. Adame Colt, Regent of Edinburgh University, being called to the Ministry of Borthwick (whence he was trans- ported to Inveresk, where he died of good age and much reputation for learning, wisdome, and pietie), Mr. Hislop, returning out of Germany, was the second time called to the Regency, and had charge of Mr. Adam Colt's classes."
Such is the account of Mr. Adam Colt's appoint- ment to, and professorial work in, Edinburgh University as furnished by Crawford, but the date given in the last paragraph is an evident error. Dr. Hew Scott in Fasti Ecclesiw Scoticanw
94 INVERESK PARISH LORE.
may be held to be a more reliable authority, its information regarding parishes in this Presbytery having been carefully collected from the Church Records by the late scholarly minister of Newbattle, the Rev. Dr. Robert Gordon. From this source we learn that Mr. Colt was admitted to the ministry, September 1595, presented to Borthwick parish by King James, llth May 1596, and translated to Inveresk in 1597, the exact date not being recorded. He was already a large landed proprietor, and, about eleven years before his induction, had ac- quired from Chancellor Maitland all the land around St. Michael's Church, eastwards as far as the village of Inveresk extends with the exception of Inveresk Lodge and Halkerston Lodge, which are pre -Re formation buildings, and on the south, west, and north to the river bank and town's lands. But the terms on which these lands were obtained, whether by gift or purchase, cannot be ascertained. When Mr. Colt became settled in the parish, he built a residence for himself upon his own estate near the Church, and had a path formed through the grounds from the house to a doorway which can still be seen in the wall near the north entrance to the churchyard, and which even in the present century continued to be called " the Minister's walk." A small building in the Churchyard opposite where this path ter- minates was then " the Session House at the north
MINISTRY OF MR. ADAM COLT. 95
stile," and nicely situated for the minister's con- venience. The suitability of its site and arrange- ments has suggested to some that Inveresk House must have been really the old Manse of the parish, but had in some unexplained way passed from its original purpose. That this was the case we have heard argued with plausibility. Where lack of information failed, learned antiquarian fiction came in, and furnished beautifully elaborate explanation of how the transfer would be accomplished. And as an erroneous impression lingers long and sometimes is revived, it may be as well to put the matter right by showing it to be altogether wrong.
In a report dated 1627, there is stated as the last of the emoluments payable to the minister, "Ane hundreth poundis yearly of ye Towne of Musscilburgh ffor ye Vicarage." This makes it clear that Mr. Colt did not occupy or sub-let the official residence to which he was entitled, but was paid an annual sum as an equivalent, and explains how, after the incumbency had been held by Mr. Colt and by Mr. Oliver, his son and successor, succeeding ministers had a manse found them near where the old vicars had their abode. During the building of Inveresk House, to be hereafter described, Mr. Colt occupied Millholme, to which his grounds extended, and which — once the dower-house of the family — is situated at the
96 INVERESK PARISH LORE.
west end of High Street, Musselburgh, behind the mill there.
Further proof that Inveresk House was not the manse of the parish is found in the Session Minutes of Mr. Oliver Colt's time. On 14th June 1659, he reported that one of the houses at the manse had been blown down upon the windy Sunday, and desired the Session either to put it up or permit him to do so, on the under- standing that he would be refunded what it cost. To the latter alternative the Session agreed a fortnight later. Another Minute, dated 19th February 1671, sets forth that divers of the neighbours in the Dambrae had given in l!a supplication for repairing the heid of the dyke belonging to the glebe which, through the break occasioned, horse, nolt, sheep and other beasts have entrie into the other yairds thereabout to the great prejudice and hurt of all the neighbours there. The Session agreed to have the dyke biggit with earth and stone to prevent cause of complaint and gave orders accordingly. These entries shew that the old vicarage was where the present manse is situate adjoining to Dambrae.
In the report from which we have already quoted there occurs the following in reference to the Music School, for which King James provided an endowment : — " Item, thair is ane Musicke
96
:dnd the
>• pr<xrf that i'*v ;- i i--. *•»** not
.nanse t>f &hfc parish i* n-a
Minutes of Mr. Oliver Colt's thru-. * 1659, hu reported that one of the manxe had been blown down upon th« Sunday, and desired the Session either to put it up or permit him to do' so, on the under- standing that he would bo refunded what it cost. To the latter altenMMJv*; tbfc ifewnon agreed a fortnight laior. .\r>oti*M- i-- v!»ted V)tih
February 1671, set* forth t.i-.*». l>jurs in th« Drtnpl*^: >n £ r r&fx,
other «>ca.sts
tntr-i yairds thereabout
nnd hurt of all the
Session agreed to have
. eartli and stone to prevent
co«.;ri»4iit and gave orders accordingly.
-*»trit •;•* »hew that the old vicjirage was
wher< the j resent manse is situate adjoining to
In the report from which w« havia already qiK3*e<l thn$re vxicurs the following *» reference to the 3ti«*:e Scli;»l, for which Kin^c Raines provided an eiictt>-^H..»-'Ut .---'Item, thair k *ne Musicke
MINISTRY OF MR. ADAM COLT. 97
Schule in Muscilburgh quhairto umquhile King James quha lait deceissit of worthie memorie, gifftit, iijc mcrkis monie furth of ye yearlie dewtie of ye erectit lordeschip of Neubottle. Thys pen- sionne wes gevin be ye umquhile Kingis Majestie to umquhile Mr. Andro Blakhall, minister ffor ye tyme at ye sayd Kirk ef Musscilburgh, and toe hys sone Mr. Andro Blakhall, presint minister of Aberladie, toe ye use and behove of ye said Musicke Schule, and ye sayd Mr. Andro lies sauld and disponit of ye sayd pensionne, and that the paroche and ye schule is frustratit of hys Majestie's gifft."
Such Song Schools were not uncommon at the period, and were principally intended to train their scholars for the proper rendering of sacred music. It is a pity that the Parish should have enjoyed the one it had for so short a time, and that it should have been deprived of the means of support- ing it in the manner which Mr. Colt and his co- signatories describe.
The fact of two regents, or professors, in succes- sion having been appointed after Mr. Blackball tells of the importance attached to the charge ; and Mr. Colt having been proposed as one of the ministers for Edinburgh, the year after his settlement in Inveresk, indicates the estimation in which he was held as a Presbyterian pastor.
Much it is to be regretted that the Kirk- Session
G
98 INVERESK PARISH LORE.
Records of Inveresk do not extend back beyond the ministry of Mr. Colt's son, and that no trace of any earlier minutes have yet been discovered. Contemporary history, however, is not without its use in supplementing facts which have been pre- served, and in casting light upon the Parish annals. We are fortunate in having had placed at our service the valuable family information contained in the History of the Colts of tlwt Ilk, compiled and printed for private circulation by Captain Colt of Gartsherrie, whose kindness in communicating particulars we desire thus specially to acknow- ledge.
During the year of Mr. Adam Colt's ministry at Borthwick, Scott's Fasti states that he " was one of those appointed by the General Assembly for a conference with the Commissioners of his Majesty." Now this must have been an important duty to entrust to a minister newly entered upon his first charge. But, important as it undoubtedly was, Mr. Adam Colt had already had considerable experience in trying circumstances, and had been resident in the metropolis at a time of great excitement and revolution. The turbulence of rival factions had brought the country more than once to the verge of anarchy, and the armed bands which powerful nobles controlled had not been slow to plunge large districts into all the horrors of a state of war. Civil discord had been fomented with English intrigue for
MINISTRY OF MR. ADAM COLT. 99
the undisguised purpose of weakening the country, and the accredited agent of Elizabeth blushed not to avow he hoped that peace and the linking of all the Scottish nobility would never be. To these hindrances to stable government the friends of the Reformation and the adherents of the old faith added their mutual abhorrence, and rendered the position of the young king one of peril and per- plexity.
In his childhood and youth the Estates of the Realm entrusted the training of the heir to the throne to competent men. Chief of these was George Buchanan, one of the greatest of Scotland's scholars, a strict disciplinarian, of whom and the tawse James retained unpleasant recollections ; but of the learning he acquired, and the skill in argu- ment to which he attained he was inordinately proud. From being the victim of treachery and treason, and the object of unbridled clerical invec- tive, he braced himself in early manhood to assert his position, and to bring his unruly subjects into subjection to law. Nor yet did he venture to claim —
" The right divine of kings to govern wrong."
In the spring of 1596 affairs were in this state, and James returned to Holy rood from the enjoy- ment of hunting, of which he was passionately fond, for the express purpose of attending the meeting of Assembly and delivering an oration.
100 INVERESK PARISH LORE.
On the 25th of March the king appeared in the Assembly, accompanied by an escort of the high- est nobles, and was warmly welcomed by the Moderator in the name of his brethren. In his speech James bore himself right royally, and dis- coursed upon the affairs of Church and State with wisdom and discretion. He declared his zeal for religion, and that he esteemed it greater honour to be a Christian than to be a king. One ambition only tired him, and it was to make himself a reputation " as the establisher of religion, and the provider of livings for the ministry through- out his whole dominions." Pleading for paid troops and a standing army, he said, " The times were changed since their forefathers followed each his lord or his laird to Pinkie Field ; a confused multitude, incapable of discipline, and an easy prey to regular soldiers, as the event of that miserable
O '
day could testify. . . . Since then the fashion and art of war had entirely altered ; and he pro- tested it was a shame that Scotland should be lying in careless security, whilst all other countries were up and in arms."
The favourable effect produced by this procedure was increased by the action which immediately followed. By a royal message the king caused intimation to be given to the Assembly that it was his resolution to have ministers appointed to all the kirks in Scotland, and arrangements made to
MINISTRY OF MR. ADAM COLT. 101
provide them with sufficient stipends as far as could be done. And to accomplish this he asked the Assembly to appoint commissioners to meet in conference with the councillors he had appointed, and to fix upon a plan to give his resolution effect. This, then, was the duty to which Mr. Adam Colt was called, and in discharging it there can be little doubt he would be brought into close contact with Lord Dunfermline, then chief of the Octavians, and busy "bigging for himself a braw house at Pinkie." What influence that may have had in procuring Mr. Colt's transference to Iiiveresk it is impossible at this distance of time to learn ; but it is not likely to have been without effect, and to have had something to do with that friendship and respect which King James so long and firmly cherished for the frank and fearless minister of St. Michael's.
The amicable relations between the Crown and the Kirk just noticed were of but short duration. Each side was eager to take advantage of the other, and the boundary line which separates lawful civil jurisdiction from undefined spiritual independence a never-failing source of trouble. Toleration was a virtue little recognised, and
O '
Christian charity a duty as little practised. If the king in his eagemesss for greater power over- stepped his obligations, there were not wanting those among the clergy who claimed a freedom in the pulpit incompatible with liberty and the golden
102 INVERESK PARISH LORE.
rule which the Master enjoins. The result was another crisis in the struggle, and scenes of dis- order in the metropolis that boded no good. James by this time was getting accomplished in kingcraft, and seeing an advantage gained, at once took the benefit of it. He laid the city under ban, removed his residence from it, declared it no fit place for justice to be administered, and directed the law courts to go thence where he should appoint; bound the magistrates to compear at Perth to stand their trial, and the offending ministers to be indicted. Edinburgh was aghast at this, and sued for the royal clemency. James, meanwhile, prolonged the anxiety, but ordered a meeting of the Estates and of the General Assembly to be held at Perth on the 1st of March following. Of this Assembly Mr. Adam Colt was a member. The king had secured the attendance of a " sufficient number " of sub- servient members, and boldly sought to overturn Presbytery and to replace it with Episcopacy. In person he submitted a series of craftily-framed Articles, upon which he called the Assembly to pronounce, expecting to entrap them into taking up an untenable position. According to Spottis- wood all that James desired was to see " a decent order established in the Kirk, which should be consistent with the word of God, the custom of primitive times, and the laws of the realm." So easy is it to claim Scriptural authority upon occa-
MINISTRY OF MR. ADAM COLT. 103
sion to suit a purpose. The gage of war was thus thrown down, and not till the long, sore struggle was ended, had the land or the Kirk rest. In looking back upon the part which Mr. Adam Colt took in that trying time, it is difficult to decide whether most to admire his bearing as a Christian minister or the gentlemanliness of his conduct, ever in harmony with Paul's needful but much-neglected counsel, "be courteous." To please the king he never cringed, to defend the right he ever dared, and the dictates of his conscience he unflinchingly obeyed. Such a character and such an example was not without effect, and James himself was not proof against it. Differ from each other they un- doubtedly did, and unpleasantness sometimes arose in consequence, but the king could not fail to recog- nise the honesty of the minister's heart, and the sincerity of his convictions. Intercourse with Mr. Colt his Majesty therefore courted, and counsel from him he sometimes sought. It is not, there- fore, surprising to find that he both visited and corresponded with him, and that the chair which the king used upon his visits at Inveresk House is still carefully preserved among family relics at Gartsherrie. An important letter to him from the king we will give in as close a rendering of the original as possible ; and here we note the fol- lowing entry, relative to it, taken from the Lord Treasurer's accounts preserved in H.M. Register
104 1NVERESK PARISH LORE.
House, Edinburgh : — " Item, to ane boy passand of Edinburgh (to Inveresk House) with clos Itres (letters) that come from his Matie (Majesty) to Mr Adame Colt xiij8 iiijd, May 1606."
Mr. Adam Colt was a member of the Assembly held at Edinburgh, May 1601. At that Assembly he was appointed, along with Mr. James Gibson, as Commissioner to Merse and Teviotdale, " thair care and diligence pairtlie to be to appoint minis- ters in thair livings, and to try ye life, doctrine, and manner of conversation of ye nimistrie of ye Bounds committed to thair visitation."
A notable instance of Mr. Colt's force of character and high sense of duty is furnished in this Assem- bly. Calderwood, in describing it, says, " When the king was headstrong to have the ministers of Edinburgh transported, Mr. Adam Colt opposed him face to face in the General Assembly on their behalf. The king's chief argument was, that he himself, who was a principal parishioner in his chief city, could not be edified by them. Mr. Adam Colt answered, that by that reason when he is angry at any minister in the country he may, if he will, have him transported, the preparative whereof had already passed at St. Andrews, which is very dangerous. Upon which the king called him a seditious knave, and asked why he supposed such a thing ? "I suppose," he added, " Mr. Adam Colt would steal neate (cattle), then he should be
MINISTRY OF MR. ADAM COLT. 105
hangitt." Mr. Colt did neither, however, and we find him again face to face with the king as a member of the Assembly " halden att Halierude- house," 15th November 1602; and representa- tive of the Presbytery of Dalkeith at a meeting of the Synod of Lothian held at Tranent, 15th August 1602, where he signed the Confession of Faith, for the second time, along with Archbishops Spottiswood and Law, and others.
On the morning of Thursday 24th March 1603, Queen Elizabeth died at Richmond, and before ten o'clock that same morning, James VI. of Scotland was publicly proclaimed in London as her suc- cessor. News of this event was carried to Scot- land by Sir Robert Carey, who rode post-haste, and reached the king's apartments at Holyrood on Saturday night following, after his Majesty had retired to rest. Among other arrangements for his departure, James committed the care of his second son, who became Charles I., to Chancellor Seton of Pinkie, and on Tuesday, 5th April, started to take possession of his new throne by way of Mussel - burgh. The three following years saw great changes. Of these, Tytler says, " No sooner did he ascend the English throne than he openly professed his ad- herence to the Episcopal form of government, and set himself to overturn the Scottish Church. In the short space of three years he procured the complete overthrow of the Presbyterian constitution,
106 INVERESK PARISH LORE.
and the declaration by the Scottish Parliament that the royal prerogative extended over all persons and causes whatsoever — civil, commercial, and ecclesiastical." When he had so planned, his Majesty commanded the attendance at Richmond of Mr. Adam Colt, Mr. Andrew Melville, Mr. James Melville, Mr. James Balfour, Mr. William Watson, Mr. William Scott, Mr. John Carmichael, and Mr. Robert Wallace. His letter to Mr. Colt was of the following tenor : — "To OUR TRUSTIE and weill belovit, MR. ADAM
COLT, Minister of Godis Worde att Inveresk, att
hys house of Inveresk near Muscilburgh. " JAMES R.,
" Trustie and weill belovit we greit you heartilie weill.
" Our earnest desire to entertaine that happie peace of the Church of oure Kingdoms of Scotland, quilk with grit care and travell we left universallie established therein att our removing hither, hevin since ffrom tyme to tyme beene manifested be our Itres to maist of ye Synods of that Realm and to divers of our Commissioners be missives and in- structiones, als weill verball als in writing, and more parfaitlie ratified be letters written to our Counsall with our aine hand purporting maist clear testimonie of ye constancie of oure luvc to all weill affected members of that bodie, which be proclamations and imprentit declarationes wes
MINISTRY OF MR. ADAM COLT. 107
lykewise als solemnlie publishit, als ye notorietie thereof wuld be unknawn to none, but such als through senselessnesse would naither heare or see ; hevin nathlesnesse so little prevalit with some in- credulous, wilfull, ingrate, and malicious disposit persons, als some of them have nott forborne rash- lie to centenne and disobey oure author! tie, charges and commandements, and so stubbornlie to persist m theire contumacie als theire malicious obsta- nacies hes forced us to intende greater rigoure agin thame thann oure inclinacioune alloweth. Yitt, farre lesse thann thair offences did deserve ; and uthers have presumit in Pulpitt fullishlie to justifie ye obstinate and malicious proceedings of thair bretherin, and therewith to slaundere oure juste commandements, and lauchfull proceedins of oure Counsall ; als also ye Synodis bein requirit be oure letters (and Commissioneres) directit to thame, to provide ffor thair aine pairtes, sae ffar as in thame laie, to giff us assurance that certaine actis establishit in fformer Assemblies necessarie fFor yee weale and peace of ye Kirke particularlie expressit in oure instructionis sent unto thame, maie be ordeanit be thame not to bee propound, treated or altered at ye nixt Generall Assemblie, quilk we know now toe bee ffitte toe bee untuiched and owerpast att ye samen, than that aine rnentione sould bee mayde of thame, leest thairbye occaisione sould arise of distractioune in ye Kirke and offence
108 INVERESK PARISH LORE.
toe ourselves ; Yitt thay soe littel regairtit ye airnestnisse of oure sute, als thair ansowers uni- versallie tendit toe ane prisint delaye, without anie assurance of thair performing att ye Assemblie of that quilk ffor thair ain weill wee soe ainiestlie urgitt, quliairin findin a masquerade oppositioune toe oure just peticioune than we culd ever have expectit in any such case, these things and uther weichtie reesounes, have movit us heerbye to will and command you, all excuses sett asyde, not toe faile with diligence to repaire towairts us beefoire ye 15th day of September nixt, toe ye intint we maie that daie beginne with yourself and suche uthere of your bretheren als we have knawn toe bee of gude learning, judgment, and experience, and commandit likewise toe bee heere att that samen tyme, toe treete with you in matters con- cerning ye peace of our sayde Kirke of Scotland, and toe mak oure constant and unchangeable favoure borne toe all dutiefull members of that bodie, manifestlie knawn untoe you, quhairbye yee maie be bound inn dutie and conscience toe comf'orme yourselves toe our godlie meanin, and toe hear true witnessing ifor justifein ye lauchfull- nesse off all oure intenciounes and actiounes, als weill concernin ye haill kirke, als ye particulaire members thairof ; and that it maie bee manifest toe all ye warld that we haie embassed ourselfe for gevin satisfactioune toe all that are of that
MINISTRY OF MR. ADAM COLT. 109
proffessioune farther than uther Princes accompt beeseenine toe thair estate. If thai rf or anie tur- bulent spirits bee not recallit toe thair dutie but persiste maliciouslie inn undutiefull contempt of us, it maie then bee worthielie judgeit that ye severite quhilk bee thair obstinacie we maie bee forcit toe use, sail raithar bee violentlie extortit agin oure nature, ffor thair overthrowe.
" Thus hoping yee will note faile precisclie toe keep ye foresaide appoyntit daie, als ye tender oure seruice, and ye weille of ye kirke, wee bid your fareweill,
" at oure Manour of Greinwiche,
"ye 21st Maie 1606."
It is to be remembered that in the ea.r]y months of the same year John Welch, son-in-law of John Knox, and five other ministers had been put upon their trial, and the most shameful means resorted to, to obtain their conviction. Their defence was brilliantly conducted by Mr., afterwards Sir, Thomas Hope of Craighall. Of this trial the celebrated Lord Hailes remarks : " We see here the prime minister, in order to obtain a sentence agreeable to the king, address the judges with promises and threats, pack the jury, and then deal with them without scruple and ceremony. It is also evident that the king's advocate disliked the proceedings as impolitic and odious, but that he had not resolu-
110 INVERESK PARISH LORE.
tion to oppose them." Little is there to surprise, then, that the other seven prominent ministers who received letters similar in purport to the one we have given were not eager to obey the king's call, but, along with Mr. Colt, held counsel together what was to be done.
They had other duties on hand, which they re- solved first to discharge, having been elected as representatives from the Assembly to attend the meeting of the Scottish Parliament at Perth in July. That done, they set out for London — some by sea, others by land. Any misgivings they entertained were more than verified by the treat- ment they met with after their arrival at Court. Outwardly, a show of respectful recognition was manifested, but underneath this gloss was the most transparent design to compass their defeat and downfall, and to force them into becoming traitors to their country and their Church. Space forbids us entering into details of the open and surreptitious plans adopted, and of the shameful effrontery of the minions of the king in their serpent-like sub- tlety of attack. For months these tactics were pitilessly plied, but not one of these brave Scots- men could be found base enough to sacrifice truth and duty, even to please a king. Andrew Melville was basely condemned to the Tower, whence he was not released till after four years' confinement ; his nephew James to perpetual banishment from
MINISTRY OF MR. ADAM COLT. Ill
Scotland ; and the other six, Tytler incorrectly states, were allowed to return to Scotland, but were not permitted to settle in their own parishes.
As regards Mr. Adam Colt, an order "Givin at our Court at Quhythall (Whitehall) 10 May 1607." was sent him, signed by James, and countersigned by Marr, Dunbar, " Secretar," toe goe home and be confynit within hys awin paroche at Mussil- burgh ; " and we incline to the opinion that the other five were similarly dealt with. An ex- pedient this, apparently suggested by the well- known punishment of " confinement to barracks" which defaulters in garrison are awarded, and was therefore, in the case of these faithful ministers, all the more reprehensible.
In the year 1627 King Charles I. appointed a Royal Commission to collect information regarding the several parishes of Scotland and their Endow- ments. Forty-nine only of all the returns then obtained have been discovered, and one of these is that relative to this parish. It bears to be " Ansueris maid be Mr. Adame Colt, Minister of the Evangell at the Kirk of Inueresk, alias Mussilburgh, within the Presbyterie of Dalkeith, and be John Wernour, one of the balleis of Mussil- burgh, Robert Dowglas and Robert Wernour, all portionaris of Inueresk, and Thomas Hunter, in Cowsland, Inhabitants within the said parochine, and electit and chosen be the said Minister, and
112 INVEKESK PARLSH LORE.
sworn before the Lordis Commissionaris. To the articles set doun be thair lordschips and contenit in the charge direct to the said Minister." The report proceeds :—
" 1. In the FIRST we declair that thair ar of Communicantis iijm (3000) or thairby.
" 2. The haill landis and rowmes within the said paroche ar about ane myle to the kirk, except the toun and landis of Cowsland quhilk is twa myles.
" 3. Our said kirk is not united to na uther kirk, and it is ane of the paroche kirks of Dumfermling, and the Kingis Majestie is patrone thairof.
" 4. I the said Mr. Adame Colt, Minister, declaires that I have of yeirlie stipend for serving the cure at the said kirk iijc (800) merkis money and I Chalder aittis (oats) payed to me be Sir Henry Wardlaw, Chalmerlane to his Majestie out of His Hieness rentis of the Lordschip of Dumfermling, With ane part of the vicarage of the said par- ochine of Inueresk possest be the gentilmen and heritouris of the landis within the same ilk man for his awne part ffor the whilk they sould pay me yeirlie fourtie schillingis for ilk pleuch of land. Ane uther pairt of the said vicarage (quhilk is the tiend fifche) were possest be the umquhile Erie of Dumfermling and now be his Countess, for the quhilk hir tacksman pays hir yeirlie iijc money, and the vicarage teindis of the croft of land call it the Holmes pertening to the burgh of Mussilburgh,
lo the ponfcenit ?/' The
In tV FIRST we d »< •!
• uurivjvtrtiH iijm (3000) or
" 2. Th«- haill landis and rowriR parocho ar about ane myle to the kir tbuii and landis of Cowsland quliilk is twa myles.
" 3. Our said kirk is not united to na uther kirk, and it is ane of the JV»POC!M* kirk* of Dwnfermling, and the Kin^i>» Maji-.^f*- ^ \^-- '<*•'• iKwrof.
a 4. I the saki Mr. Adtuu? CH4, Mini»t«r, ^w that I have <»f ycnriif Nt^wnJ ?«>y
. i
• V *. . ; Durnf erni :
.;: ^*of the said par-
+-. the gentilmen and
,iun the same, ilk man
iwm> }*«*, ^«v t4»e \vhilk they sould pay
i« fourtiv ^ujlmgis for ilk pleuch oHand.
\ r pairi of the said vicarage (quliilk is tJje
ohe) w«ro possest be the umquhili- Erie of
•ling and now be his Countess, for the
k hir tacksman pays hir yeirlic ilj« money,
&i\n tlv* vi«arA^ teindi* of the ci-oft of Uwd cailit
the Hohw* |MrtttittDg to the burgh of M.-,?*ilburph.
MINISTRY OF MR. ADAM COLT. 113
and the teindis of the croft callit Hudiscroft, and of the aiker callit Thomas' aiker pertening to David Rammage and Henry Calderwood, and the teindis of the aiker callit Rude aiker, and of four croftis of land besyde Mussilburgh pertening to the Laird of Craigmillar, and the tendis of sum burrow riggis and tallies besyde Mussilburgh as possest be Jean Blakhall in Mussilburgh be pretendit richt and tollerance of the said Sir Henry Wardlaw and Mr. William Wardlaw, his sone, for yeirlie pay- ment to thame of 1 Chalder beir, moreover I have jc lib (£100) of the toune of Mussilburgh for the vicarage.
" 5. We declair that there is ane Grammar Schoole in Musselburge, and that it is very necessary that ane schoole be there, for our said parochine is populous. But there is na foundation nor provision for ane schoole except xvij lib Scots, or thereby of annuals paid out of certain houses in Mussil- burgh doitit of old to the chaplanreis callit Alareit (Loretto) and St. James besyde Mussilburgh.
Next follow particulars of the endowment given by King James VI. for. a Music (Sang) School, and an explanation of how the parish and burgh became deprived of that royal benefaction already quoted.
" 6. Thair is na hospital in the parish and it is necessar that thair should be ane in respect thair ar many honest decayed persons within the same H
114 INVERESK PARISH LORE.
and thair ar sundrie small teinds and dewties founded and doit for ane and specially thair is ane chapelle callit Magdalene Ohapelle gifted to Mr. Robert Creichton for the quilk he gettis yeirlie xvj lib fra Mr. David Preston of Quhythill (White- hill). Item thair ar four croftis land besyde Mussil- burgh possest be the Laird of Craigmillar and ane aiker callit the Rude Aiker, and twa riggis We know not be what form or manner nor for what dewtie but we suspect they belang to sum alterage within our said parochine and thair are sum an- nuallis vpliftit be Mr. Robert Creichton furth of certaine housis in Musselburgh We know not quhat way nor be what richt and title.
" 7. We knaw of na uther chaplanreis, prebend- aries, nor frier landis within our said parochine.
Then follow particulars regarding the teindable lands in the parish, which may be thus sum- marised ; —
Property. Holder. Extent.
Cowsland Lord Chancellor 40 husband lands Lands & Maynes of
Carbarrie James Rig 12 pleuch lands Lands & Maynes of
Smeton 32 oxingaits
Inveresk The King 13 pleuch lands
Monktounhall (1) Feuars portioners 8 pleuch lands.
Monktoun Alex. Hay 5 pleuch lands
Quhythill (2) Edward Preston 3 pleuch Jlands
Stonyhill Robert Dobbie 3 pleuch lands
MINISTRY OF MR. ADAM COLT. 115
Property. Holder. Extent.
Pinkie (3) Earl of Dunfermline 15 Oxingaits
Quhyteside Robert Fawsyde of 1 pleuch land
that ilk
Crofts beysde Stock worth
Musselburgh Laird of Craigmillar 1 chalder and
Tarress Croft Hew Brown Teind at
(Teind at 6 bolls) 8 bolls
A perusal of this interesting report reveals how Church properties were taken possession of with- out scruple by private persons for personal ends with the connivance of others whose care it should have been to prevent such appropriation, and it shows how, even so near to the time of plundering, it was most difficult for influential persons on the spot to obtain accurate information or to get re- stitution made, from the want of any authentic records to which they could have recourse. On the other hand it shows the minister of Inveresk and the laymen associated with him to have been fearless in the discharge of duty to the delinquent and " suspect," granting no privilege and making no distinction, and actuated with a praiseworthy regard for the interests of education and the relief of the necessitous.
NOTES. — 1. Teinds in the hands of Sir Thomas Gutter- house, tacksman to the king. 2. Teinds in the hands of the Earl of Dunfermline. 3. "The stok and teinds of old paid four chalders and now twenty chalders, but in respect of the multitude of laboraris," the reporter says, " we think the
116 INVERESK PARISH LORE.
stok may pay yearlie communibus annus in tynie cuming x chalders." An oxingait or oxgang contained thirteen acres ; a husband-land was two oxingaits or twenty-six acres ; a pleuch land or ploughgate was eight oxingaits, or one hun- dred and four acres.
XI.
OLD COMMUNION CUPS.
CURING the incumbency of Mr. Adam Colt, the parish church became possessed of four handsome silver communion cups, but up till five years ago no certain knowledge was obtainable regarding them. That lack of information is now supplied.
Among the records preserved by the Session is a book of parish accounts, titled " Liber sessionis 117
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ecclesia apud Inneresk" — that is, Session Book of the Church at Inveresk. It contains, in beautiful old-fashioned hand- writing, particulars of the receipts and " debursements " for the period 1655-1669. Its first page is headed, " Januar 2, 1655, The which day Richard Calder- wood entered Treasurer for receiving of Collections and penalties for the Burgh part," and its second, " The which day Robert Hislop, in Monktonhall, entered Treasurer for receiving of Collections and penalties for the Landward." An entry, Januar 19, 1655, shews the retiring Treasurers to have accounted for their intromissions " for ye year 1654 " at meetings held that day, and to have handed over all money, documents, etc., in their charge. In the inventories of these, the newly- entered Treasurers acknowledge respectively as follows : — " Item, Twa Silver Comunion Cups,"- " Item, received also by ye sd. Rot. Hislop, ye two Comunion Cups of silver, ye Burgh Thesaurer having ye other two."
These are the earliest known written records of the Old Communion Cups. When, where, or by whom, made ; how, or from whom, obtained, seemed points never likely to be ascertained. But the unique and splendid collection shewn in the Edinburgh International Exhibition, in which one of these cups was included, invested the subject of old Scottish Communion Plate with fresh interest,
OLD COMMUNION CUPS. 119
and the curiosity to learn more thus excited came to be fully gratified.
Upon all silver articles made during the seven- teenth century, Acts of the Scottish Parliament required three Hall marks to be put. Each of our cups bear these, the stamp of the maker, of the place where made, and of the Assay Master. These marks, carefully examined and compared with the Records of the Edinburgh Goldsmiths' Hall, by favour of Mr. Michael Crichton, Deacon of the Incorporation, 1889, prove that all four Inveresk cups were made in 1621, at Edinburgh, by George Crawford, a silversmith, who made the Newbattle cups in 1618, and was twice Deacon of the Incor- poration, 1621-3, 1633-5. The Assay Master who stamped them was James Dennistoun ; his name is sometimes spelled Danielstown. He was a member of the corporation, 1613-1644.
The dimensions of the cups are, full height, 8-f inches, diameter of base, 4-g inches, diameter of bowl, 6£ inches, depth of bowl, 2£ inches. On one, in the bottom of the bowl, is engraven a shield, having three crescents within a double tressure flowered and counter-flowered, in its first and fourth quarters, and three cinq uef oils on a hori- zontal bar in its second and third quarters. The escutcheon is surmounted by an Earl's coronet, a crescent, and the word " Semper," around the whole being the motto "Nee cede adversis rebus
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nec crede secundis," which freely rendered reads, " Neither retreat before adversity, nor put confi- dence in prosperity."
This coat of arms, of which we give an illustra- tion, is that of Alexander, first Earl of Dunferm- line, who owned Pinkie House, where in one of the rooms, he had these armorial bearings placed, with horses representing Liberty as supporters, and this very motto. These still remain in excellent pre- servation.
In design the cups are simple, chaste, elegant, the outlines graceful and well-proportioned. The only ornament used is a band of exquisite chas- ing round the base. These cups are historic monuments of no common value. So long as the Church confined to the clergy the cup of blessing — as it is called by St. Paul — small chalice cups alone were used ; but among the changes effected by the Reformation, all believers were admitted to partake of the Sacrament of the Supper in the manner appointed by Our Lord ; and, in token of this, the Scottish Reformers directed " large silver cups " to be provided 'for Sacramental use.
In a letter written by the donor of these cups, " From Pinkie, 24 May 1621 " to " his maist honour- able good friend Sir Robert Ker, off Ancrum, in the Prence his Heighness' bed-chalmer," as given in Mr. George Seton's memoir of Chancellor Seton,
OLD COMMUNION CUPS. 121
a pleasant glimpse is had of this fine old gentle- man. Lord Dunfermline had cultivated a frame of mind which enabled him to contemplate death without fear. He tells, Sir Robert "In bulk or banis I find yit leittll decay in me," yet reckoned it prudent not to be so ready as formerly to under- take work. However, he continued sufficiently robust to be able to use the same bow at archery that he had been accustomed to handle forty years before. In the vigour of his manhood, the Earl had been no sluggard, but had filled many important positions. From encountering " fashious " pieces of business he did not shrink. As Chancellor of Scotland, Senator of the College of Justice, Presi- dent of the Court of Session, Lord Provost of Edinburgh, Chief Magistrate of Elgin, and Bailie of Dunfermline, his lordship did his duty with diligence and discretion. Little wonder as even- tide approached he felt " nocht sae readie to tak meikill in baud." On the morning of Sunday, 16 June 1622, the Earl died at Pinkie after a fort- night's illness, during which he was lovingly at- tended by devoted relatives and his condition eagerly enquired for by anxious friends. His. remains were interred at Dalgetty, in Fife, 9th July following.
Six years before Lord Dunfermline's death, the parish and burgh must have been greatly exercised over the King's coming. The recently issued ninth
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volume of the Register of the Privy Council of Scotland gives an excellent idea of the general hubbub which that event occasioned. For the royal progress northwards in May, preparations were begun in the preceding January, and re- quisitioning upon a scale now hardly conceivable was put in operation. Every parish had to furnish its quota of carts properly equipped with competent drivers, and any failure or lack of punctuality entailed a heavy penalty. The joy of welcoming King James VI. must have been considerably modi- fied by these exactions. Nor were the demands confined to providing transports for the baggage. The royal pantry had to be plenished, and for it, Musselburgh was stented to provide a dozen fed oxen for the feast-making at Holyrood. When this happened, Mr. Colt was still in the active discharge of ministerial duty, and doubtless Lord Dunfermline and he would both see that the burgh, which four years earlier had received a Charter from Queen Anne, proved equal to the emergency.
Mr. Colt demitted his charge 3rd June 1641, and was succeeded by his son Oliver who had taken his M.A. degree at Edinburgh in 1621, received license 1627, and was ordained and installed helper 1632. Mr. Oliver Colt was a member of the Assembly of 1638, and was presented to Inveresk by Charles I., 14th May 1641 He became his
OLD COMMUNION CUPS. 123
father's colleague on 3rd, and his successor on 4th June following.
In the diary of Sir Thomas Hope the entry, " Att sevin in the morning gude Mr. Adame Colt, my Regent, and minister at Inveresk, deceasit, Fryday, 24th March 1643," shews the affection cherished for him by his distinguished pupil. Mr. Colt's ministry left behind a good record. He is spoken of as "hevin much reputationne ffor learning, wisdome and pietie, and ane of those accountit eminente ffor grace and giftis of fay the - fullness and success."
When Mr. Oliver Colt succeeded to the full charge of the incumbency the lord of the regality of Musselburgh was John, second Lord Thirlstane, whose son became the Duke of Lauderdale. This John, Lord Thirlstane, built Brunstane Manor- house in 1639, and thus had a residence on the border of the parish, Pinkie having been expressly withheld from the grant of Church lands which his father, Chancellor Maitland, received.
For the first ten years of Mr. Oliver Colt's ministry no records remain, but it scarce admits of doubt that regular minutes would be made at the time. The manner in which those of later date have been kept warrants this being presumed.
In 1638, the sixth year of his assistantship to his father, Mr. Oliver Colt must have witnessed a memorable event upon Musselburgh Links. As
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Commissioner from Charles I., who had been in pupillarity under Lord Dunfermline of Pinkie, the Marquis of Hamilton came to Scotland charged to discomfit the covenanting Presbyterians. Upon the links of Musselburgh he was confronted by thousands of that party, and all the way to Leith had to pass through their ranks.
In 1649 Charles I. perished upon the scaffold, and the following year found Oliver Cromwell in Oliver Colt's residence at Inveresk. By this time the latter had added to the paternal dwelling, and had placed his own monogram over its entrance.
Of the eventful period in the autumn of 1650, when Cromwell was at or about Musselburgh for a couple of months, many particulars can be gathered from his letters written thence, and from the incidents noted by Nicoll. Both agree that the English army reached Musselburgh on 25th July. Shipping came thither with stores, and trenches were thrown up. On the Wednesday after the arrival of Cromwell's force a reconnaisance of its position was made by Colonels Montgornerie and Strachane with 800 troops, and some skirmishing took place. Both sides claimed to have the ad- vantage. On the 3d August " Cromwell sent in in his awn Koatche and in kairts out of Mussilburgh 60 wounded Scots taken in the late skirmish." The little knoll on Musselburgh Links opposite Linkfield House is still regarded as the spot where
OLD COMMUNION' CUPS. 125
Cromwell's tent was placed. About midnight of 5th August Cromwell broke up his encampment and started on the march for Dunbar, but speedily returned. Sunday, the llth August, was observed as a day of fasting and prayer.
In writing to the Lord President of the Council of State from Musselburgh, Cromwell claims that he was engaged on the Lord's business rather tJian the State's, which perhaps he might reckon suffi- cient warrant for employing the Lord's day morning in marching forward from Haddington in hope of encountering the Scottish army on Gladsmoor. Disappointed in this, the vanguard pushed on to Musselburgh and the General followed at their heels. He complains of the heavy rainfall during the next few days and of the consequent discomfort experienced by his men, but we miss in any of the Lord General's letters acknowledgment of the comfortable quarters he occupied in the parish minister's house at Inveresk. The apart- ments are still pointed out which he used as living and orderly rooms. Nor does Cromwell say more than that he drew back to his old quarters at Musselburgh to replenish his scant supply of pro- visions after vainly attempting to get the Scots out of their strong position. Nicoll lets it be known it was not from English shipping the fresh stores were obtained. Cromwell, he says, went back to the Braids " with great quantities of victual quilk
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he had taken out of the mylnes. killes, and bernis of Mussilburgh and other pairts thereabout." In- discrimate making free with other people's property, however, Cromwell sternly dealt with, and on 27th September, he had three men flogged for plundering houses in Edinburgh without permission. When at length he found it necessary to return to Eng- land twenty-eight boats belonging to Musselburgh, Prestonpans and Cokkeny were requisitioned, and proceeded to Leith to assist in the embarkation of those they would gladly see go.
XII.
SEVENTEENTH CENTURY RECORDS.
rHE oldest records connected with Inveresk Church are a volume of minutes of the Session, Nov. 1651 to Aug. 1677, and a volume of Parish Accounts, 1655-16(39. Remark- ably full and carefully kept, these two books furnish a wonderful insight into the parish life, and testify to the activity with which church office-bearers looked after parishioners. The fol- lowing are given as illustrative of the contents of these volumes: —
1651, Dec. 4. — Complained Wm. Bell, miller, upon Wm. Nicoll, that he called him a thief ; the bill being proven the Session ordained him to mak his repentance the iiixt Lord's day. Dec. 11. — Compeared Wm. Nicoll, miller, before the whole congregation, and made his repentance for his slander against Wm. Bell.
For the punishment and reclamation of trans- gressors the pillar of repentance, sackcloth, the branks, and money penalties were recognized methods of discipline, and when these failed or an offender was contumacious, the case 127
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was reported to the bailies that imprisonment might be inflicted. Of all these means being employed examples occur. Breaches of the third, fourth, seventh, eighth, and ninth commandments are most frequently in evidence, but the attention of the Session was by no means confined to dealing with business of this sort.
A Scottish comrade of an Irish artillery-man in India, used to tell how, when the black cook came one Thursday evening to enquire what was wished for breakfast next morning, Pat contem- platively scratched his head and said, "Let me see, I can't ate mate to-morrow because it is Friday;" then, to overcome the difficulty, he compromised the matter by ordering "bacon and pluck." But Inveresk folks were just about as nimble at turn- ing a corner at a pinch. Here is how they managed to take the edge off the fast day: — "Januar. 4, 1652, Kichd. Calderwood did become cautioner under the paine of 20 lib. money that there should be no extraordinar meat made ready att Robt. Smeall's banquett it being a fast day." Many such entries are met with. On January 18th is " a memorandum to intimate about the repairing of the kirk against the nixt Sabboth day." At that period the fabric of Old St. Michael's must have been sadly decayed, and notices of its requiring repair at considerable out- lay frequently appear. "Januar 19. — We, Janet
SEVENTEENTH CENTURY RECORDS. 129
Edgly and Helen Dobie (in presence of John Calderwood, bail lie ; John Maknaith, George Val- lange and James Wicke) shall doe act ourselves under the penaltie of twentie pounds money toties quoties that quilk soever of us shall be found or heard scandalizing one another either privatelie or publickly, shall pay the penaltie forsaid." " Feb 17, 1652. — The Session condescend that the Laird of Monktoun should have libertie to enlarge his seat towards the body of the church as far as the foremost pillar of the Earl of Lauddaille's seat." James Smart, David Ramage, and sundrie others also desired to have their seats enlarged towards the body of the church, and it was granted unto them. On same date, " the Session hav- ing heard the Bill of William Duncan and his pairteners and the Bill of John Maisson anent the seat before the wester loft as thir bills declared, condescend that quilk soever of them shall give most for it should have it ; and lyke- wise the Session ordained that quilk soever of the pairties should get that seat, they should have but only one seat there, and also quilk soever should get that seat should procure libertie of the Earle of Lauderdgdlle and Lady Dumferm- ling, or they build there. William Duncan in his awin name, and in name of his pairteners, offered 50 mercas. John Maisson offered 40 lib., William Duncan immediately offered 46 lib. 13sh. 4d.
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Wherupon the said John Maisson appealed to the presbytery for reasons he was to give in there." A week later, Feb. 24, another competition about a seat is met with. " My Lord Cranston Makgil produced ane Bill anent ane seat in the church. The Laird of Smeaton in presence of the Session took instruments in name of himself agt. my Lord Cranstoun Makgil that the voyd and emptie room before the wester loft is yett in contest as one of the pairties themselves declared. All pairties that had interest in that voyd rowme before the wester loft being removed, the Session was content that the business should be referred to the presbytery with the former applications." Seats at that time were evidently in request and the Session appear to have had difficulty in satisfying applicants. Bailie John Calderwood made an application with a pawky way about it when so many were craneing their necks to secure chief seats in the synagogue. The bailie " produced ane Bill before the Session to have a snuch (snug) bounds in the southmost pairt nixt to Craigmillar's yle (aisle) before the bail lies seat, as would be ane seat to his wyfe qlby she might the more conveniently hear the Word of God, and he referred himself to the Session's will whatever they should injoyne him to pay for ye samine." The bailie evidently took the Session on the soft side, and he had his prayer granted, 4 lib. being all that he was called upon to pay.
SEVENTEENTH CENTURY RECORDS. 131
Other five gentlemen obtained sittings on the same easy condition. April 25, — Memorandum to choose ane Laik (lay) Elder to goe to the Synod with the minister, and on May 2, Bailie Stevenson is chosen. May 16. — Patrick Widderspoon, is ordained to put up that seat which he pulled down, and is ordered to pay 5 merks for his misde- menour. Robert Donaldson is ordained to make his public repentance nixt Sabbath day because of his scandal agt. Wm. Moore, tinker, which he did. June 20. — The Session with one voice condescends that the minister, Mr Oliver Colt, should have as much room from West Craigmillar's seat towards the body of the church as would be ane seat for him and his family. Memorandum to warn the coalhewers of Whitehill to the Session. July 25.— David Bouner, Wm. Todd, David Galbraith, Wm. Stevenson, Robt. Barrowman, (presumably these coalhewers) Compeared and on Aug. 1st, made their repentance for their profan- ity on the fast day. Aug. 1. — The Session ordained David Sellerman to pay ten pounds for receiving strangers without advertising the minis- ter or the baillie. Intimation made to desire all that have promised, to produce their testimonials before the Session. Aug. 8. — Robt. Simson and Agnes Ramsay acts themselves under the pain of 5 lib. and putting of them in the branks not to scandalize one another ever after. Nov. 7. — The
132 INVERESK PARISH LORE.
Gentillmen and those of the Session condescend that there should be a new pulpit. The baillies and sessioners of the burgh are content to pay half the expense of the pulpit with all that is not pre- judical to them in time to come. Memorandum anent the Disamitiny of Cousland, Disamitting written over another word obliterated.
January 2, 1653. — The which day John Mack- naith was elected treasurer for the burgh and Wm. Smyth in Monktounhall for the land- ward. Oct. 16, 1653. — The Session condiscends that there should be a collection for Thomas Thomson in Monktoun that had his house brunt Wh fire desires intimation made there anent the nixt Sabbeth day. The Session condescends that the weekly sermon be upon the Wednesday and desires the minister to intimat the same the nixt Sabbeth day. Oct. 25. — James Brown, Robt, Strachan, and Wm. Smyth are appointed to speak to the Lawyeres anent Adam Scott's Bill wh the minister. Oct. 30th. — Collected and given to Thos. Thomson that had his house brunt, 50 lib. Margt. Hadden made her public repentance in sack- cloth before the congregation. Nov. 16. — The Session condiscends that there be a psalme sung be the presenter before the minister comes in beith the morning and att aftenioon. March 1, 1654. — To tak notice of a woman that was delivered of a child in the back of the hill of Carbarrie. The
SEVENTEENTH CENTURY RECORDS. 133
minister exhorted the elders every one of them to goe through their quarters to visit the sick and poore and try anent straiiigers. March 5. — The minister did intimate out of the pulpit that every elder should go through their quarters upon every Sunday after sermon to try there each house and taverine and see that there be no scandal used upon the Sabbath Day. March 8. — Memorandum for excommunication of Mr Alex. Cornwll. March 12. — The minister did intimat Mr Alex. Cornwll's excommunication out of the pulpit. March 16. — It was intimat out of the pulpitt be the minister that no testimonials should be given bot at the Session table, and lykewise that straingers that had not testimonials that they should go and geit them. Memorandum, anent the aillhous in Smeiton. March 29, John Tinto declared that there was none in his house but the Laird's man and the Laird of Preston's man. John Tinto acted himself under the paine of 5 lib. that there shall none be seen druken in his house upon the Sabbath day. April 19. — Compeared, Wm. Bayne, Patrick Bull, Wm. Cuthbert and were rebuked for byding out of the kirk upon the Sabbath day. April 26. — James Brown is elected ruling elder to go to the Synod. May 14. — The dis- solution of Cousland from us and to be annexed to Cranstoun was intimate out of the pulpitt by the minister according as it was ordered by the
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Synod at Edinr. in May 1654. May 24. — Com- peared Elspeth Gilgour and Margaret Davidson for flyting being cited, whereupon the Session requeists the baillies to put thir twa in the branks to be example to others. July 12. — The Session requests the baillies to report to them what course they should take with Jennet Bishop, Jennet Wm- son, Helen Martin, who had paid no heed to the Session's summons. Apparently this application to the baillies had effect for they appeared on Oct. 3, and came under a penalty of ten pounds if they ever misbehaved again, and, in addition, all three were ordered to be put in the branks. Memor- andum for a contribution to the prisoners. Sept. 24.— The quilk day forsd the Gentill- men and elders of the Session being frequently convened they did change the weekly sermon to be upon the Tuysday. Oct. 31 — The Session requests the baillies to imprison Barbara Hintoun for her disobedience to the Session. 1655 opens with Memorandum to choose a new Session. Feb. 28 — Gives Margt. Brown, who brought a testimoniall she is maryed to a Carlisle man a 15 days to bring a testificat from under the minister's hand where she did last reside. Bessie Fowler put under a penalty of ten pounds that she shall never be heard to abuse any elder or any other neighbour. To speak to the schohnrs anent their schollers for fringing the Sabbath day in
SEVENTEENTH CENTURY RECORDS. 135
tyme of sermon. April 29 — the laird of Craig- millar is elected ruling elder to go to the Synod. May 29. — The laird of Carbarries receive " libertie" to make his seat more convenient, "lykwyse that he cause repair his yle (aisle) w* furmes, (forms), that so the common people may have the more convenience to sitt upon," and he is also called upon to strike out lights (windows) "that the church may be better enlightened thby." June 19. — The which day the minister declared that the stamp mould for the communion Tikketts which was always in the custody of Andrew Calderwood was lost, as he said, att the comming in of the English army, and so desired the treasurers to take a course for a new one in respect the communion was approaching, and there was hope it might be given. The baillies in name of the burgh desyred the stamp might be helped, and seeing the old writts of the kirk did designate it by the name of the Mussilbh. kirk and not Inueresk, they had been prejudiced by the old stamp that caryed the the name of I.K. for Inueresk kirk, the which they desyred to be helped in tyme comming. Some of the landward present answered that there could be no alteration of the stamp seeing it had for threttie or fourtie years been so, and no reason it should be changed now. The business is referred to the nixt day to a more full inciting of the Session. June 26, This was anew considered, and to avoid any
136 INVERESK PARISH LORE.
needless debate two representatives of the land- ward and two of the burghal portion were appointed to confer together and endeavour to arrive at a friendly solution of the point in dispute. On July 15 the subject was again before the Session, and in the interval the landward representatives had procured a stamp bearing the letters I.K. and O.C. standing for Inveresk kirk and Oliver Colt. The burghal elders protested against this and consider- able feeling was manifested on both sides. Event- ually the case was appealed to the presbytery after both parties had taken instruments. July 24. The heat shown at proceeding meeting reached a greater intensity, and a regular bicker of words took place upon baillie John Brown producing a stamp and a number of tokens bearing the letters M.C. and O.C. which he delivered to the kirk treasurer for the burgh for use at the communion. For a couple of years the difference continued and neither party shewed the slightest disposition to bring about an agreement. At length Mr Oliver Colt, desirous of a settlement, proposed to the Session to refer the point in dispute to the joint judgment of the Lairds of Smeaton, Stoneyhill and Carbarrie, as representing the landward, and Bailies Brown, M'Millan, and Calderwood as repre- senting the burgh, to try and arrive at some arrangement that might be satisfactory to all concerned, and on 19th July 1657 as a compromise
SEVENTEENTH CENTURY RECORDS. 137
it was agreed to have tokens bearing the letters I.K, for the landward and M.K. for the burgh. Even this concession could not be accepted graciously " but with mutual provision on both sydes that the altering of the ticketts shall no ways prejudge any of the pairties in their respec- tive rights and interests which they can claim to have to the kirk." The token of 1727 shews a further modification of this compromise and the adaptation of one token for the entire parish by the use of a monogram formed of the letters I. M.K as shewn in illustration.
The minute book appears to have been occassion- ally made use of for jottings to remind of business that required attention, and such isolated entries as, " anent the Communion." are met with.
May 13, 1656. — Compeared, Thomas Lowrie, John Anderson, George Thomson for drinking upon the Sabbath clay in tyme of divine sermon, and they were ordained to make their publick satisfaction the nixt Sabbath day. May 20. — The Session appointed Wm. Smyth, John Hislop, Robt. Ver- nor, elders to wait on the collections and serve the tables for the landward, and a corresponding appointment of burghal elders for like duties on the first day of communion, with other two groups to collect and serve upon the succeeding communion Sunday. At that time the communion was held on two Sundays following each other, and in connec-
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tion with each of these there were three week day services. A tent was erected in the church-yard and from its services communicants proceeded to the tables in relays. Repeated entries occur of Mi- Adam Colt, the minister, having handed 100 merks to one of the treasurers, " to furnish the elements to the communion." At the communion of 1 and 8 June 1658 the collections were burghal £74, 16s., 6d., Landward, £45, 19s., 8d., together £120, 16s., 2d. Scots. Payments included such items as for expenses of taking down the tables and f urines, and aill and bread for the servers at communion, £3. Washing the communion cloths, £1. Mending " the gang brod that held to communion wye, 12s." Dec. 9, 1556. — The minister "produced an Act of the Synod holden at Edinburgh, in relation to a second minister to be a helper to him, wherewith they were all weil content with provision they will fall upon a way for his maintenance: " whereupon they did nominate eight men ; 4 in the burgh and four in the landward to meit upon Friday nixt to see if they could fall upon a way for his main- tenance and report and answer to the Session." This they do not appear to have done, nor is there; any minute to show Mr Oliver Colt to have got the helper he and the Synod wished appointed. July 1. — Mr George Sutie, portioner, Inveresk, is desyred to become an elder, consents, and is admit- ted ; two days afterwards he makes application for
SEVENTEENTH CENTURY RECORDS, 139
a seat, offers £20 for the use of the pew for the privilege which the Session accepts, but about which some objection was taken, and on Aug. 1 2, Mr Sutie " submitted his business to the Laird of Carbarrie himself." 1658, Jan. 5. — Anent the little house at the North Stile to be mended by the Treasurer. May 11. — John Masson, portioner of Inveresk, and one of the elders, of his own motion made over a seat to the Session, for which his father had paid 20 lib., on the condition that " seats and dasks be there erected for the schollars of Mus- sillbh. school, which the Session were very weill pleased with, and all in one voice willinglie accepted." May 26, the quilk day ane overture being made by some of the Session anent the extracting of the Acts of Session they ordained that every Act that is made should be nixt Session day read in the audience of the Session, to see whidder or no it be conforme to their ordinance, and that it be not granted or given out to any quilk somever untill it first be heard, seen, and approved. Oct. 25. — Laird of Stoneyhill elected ruling elder to the Synod at Edr. March 22, 1659. The minister communicated a letter which came in relation to a contribution to help to big a bridge upon Tyne water. The Session all and everie one of them that were present refused to consent or to give any contribution to that object, in respect they were not able, but were greatly
140 INVERESK PARISH LORE.
burdened with a number of poor people and orphans. The illustration given of these old minutes includes in it the following: — " July 12, 1659 — The Session ordains Andrew to go to James Smyth and his wife to debar them from sitting any longer in Wm. Smyth's seat except it be with his own concent." All this ado about seats may be attributable to Cromwell's having used the church of St. Michael to stable the horses of his dragoons, and the fashion that came into vogue of having fixed sittings in presbyterian places of worship.
Aug. 19. — The Session desyred the minister to intermitt the weekly (week day) sermon during the tyme of harvest, and to intimate nixt Sabbath day. Sept. 3, Satterday — Robert Dowglas in Fisherraw became cautioner under the paine of 20 lib., that there shall be no feast made on Charles Hog's child's christening, it being a fast day on the Sabbath, Sept. 24 — Compeared Thomas Cathie and Helen Cathie's son for carrying burdens upon the Sabbath day, also Margt. Lowthian compeared for that samine. The Session desyred the minister to rebuke them. They promise never to do the lyke again, being sorie for the doing of it. Nov. 4. — Wm. Rig of Carbarrie elected ruling elder to the Synod. Dec. 25. — Compeared Wm. Younger in Fisherraw, and is ordained to stand in sackcloth the first and last day. Neither his
SEVENTEENTH CENTURY RECORDS. 141
offence or whether the said William did penance is recorded, nor what first or last day as here used meant. Dec. 11 — Compeared Geo. Kid, Robt. Forbairne and James Mill, young boys in Smeiton, delated for playing att the buoulls (marbles) on the Sabbath day. They deny the same and are ordained to be heir this day 14 days. They appear on the 25th, are rebuked and promise it will not occur again.
1661, January 27. — The names of the elders were intimate out of the pulpitt, and if there was any that had anything to object against their admission they were to corne to the Session before Tuesday nixt and make the Session acquaint ye wh. Jan. 24. — The qlk day the elders formerly nominat were present, and taken sworn were admitted, nothing being objected against them. June 11. — The minister related the ordinance of the presby- tery of Edinburg in relation to the reading in the Church, that they had ordained reading to be by the precentor, a certain space before the incoming of the minister. June 25, — Elspeth Bettson appears, charged with blasphemy " in saying God is not a righteous God in taken away my husband." She denied this, bot only confest and said "what could God do more to me." At two subsequent meetings witnesses were examined on oath in reference to this charge, and it was then remitted to the presbytery. The poor broken-hearted
142 INVERESK PARISH LORE.
widow could hardly find consolation in this method of dealing, or the more likely learn that the Lord loveth those he chastens.
Nov. 5, 1661. — The Session and the baillies desyred the minister to mak intimation out of the pulpitt anent Janet Stoddart, who was imprisoned upon the suspicion of witchcraft, that if any people has any thing to lay to her charge they was considerably to come w'n ten or twelve dayes, other ways they would Dimitt her, in regard she was great expense to the Magistratts.
1661, Dec 29.— The Session think fitt that everie Sabboath clay in the collecting of the poor folks' money that there be an elder waiting on to help to collect w* ane other ordinary man, in respect it is reported that the vulgar sort of people without authority distributts the collections to several per- suns who attend at the porch and style neidlesslie.
Corroborative of the antiquity of St. Michael's of Inveresk are such entries as these : Sept. 30, 1666. — The qlk day the Session being weiil con- vened after intimation out of the pulpitt for repairing of the ruins of the fabrick of the kirk which is above Craigmillar's yle, they did elect some of their number to meet upon it and to take cognisance of the samine how it should be best repaired. Oct. 20, 1668. — It was motioned "that the timber of the steeple is fayling," and a workman was ordered to be employed to "view it." Again
SEVENTEENTH CENTURY RECORDS. 143
May 29, 1677, two hundred merks expended on finishing the steeple as also for poynting the body of the church with sklates (slates) and lime where there had been great need of, and a committee is appointed to fix what proportion of the expendi- ture each heritor had to pay. The appointment of a special week-day service served to provide an opportunity for the celebration of marriages in church, for which there were certain dues to be applied to the relief of the poor. The desire to be singular made itself conspicuous even in this, and on Mar. 12, 1667, the Session put those parties who sought to be different from other people on the higher level for which they longed, and ordained them to be charged twentie pounds Scots money for the use of the poor. Complaint had been made even earlier that newly married couples were escorted to the kirk by multitudes of people, and their kirking was made the occasion of feasting, " which was to be thought upon att lengthly."
1670, March 20. — John Wilson, George Dreddon, and Alex. Smart, Skipperers in Fisherrow, made an application for sittings on behalf of the rest of their incorporation, which was granted upon a pay- ment for the behoof of the poor, and to be the first of the Fisherman's Loft. It must have been in a dark corner, for on 22 Feb. 1676, "a window to the Seaman's loft is condescended to."
144 INVERESK PARISH LORE.
Nov. 8, 1674. — It was intimate out of the pulpitt be the minister, that those who are able and yitt give nothing in to the brod for the use of the poor, that they amend it heirafter. If the short- comings of those able to give were thus pointedly proclaimed, an equally sharp eye was kept on the receivers of poor's money. June 22, 1675. — The qlk day it is ordained, according to ane former act, that those within the parish who goes a begging from house to house should only geit half a merk a month, and those that goes not to have a merk. The parishioners were much pestered with beggars com- ing from a distance, and to distinguish the local poor all of them who asked for alms were ordered by the Session to wear a badge upon their breast. Oct. 24. — James Richardson, younger, of Smeaton, in respect of his father's inability, Sir Adam Blair, younger, of Carbarrie, and Alexander Hay of Monktoun were proposed and approved for the eldership. The minister called attention to the large number of parishioners who were ill with bloody flux and in a starving condition: that the sums received at the church doors were inadequate to meet present necessities, and proposed that a charge of 40 shillings be made upon those who desired to have the church bell rung at the time of funerals as was done in other parishes. This was agreed to. Another expedient to increase the poor's money was a levy made for permission to erect grave stones
MEMORIAL STONE WHERE HI-BEN MARY. SURRENDERED.
of the \bJe and
hoi* able t<
prorkanftd, an equally sliurp eye w&> «eertv«iti of poor's money. June 22, 1 ti , day it is ordained, according to ane former act , those within the parish who goes a begging from house to house should only geit half a merk a month, and those that goes not to Imve a merk Th<r parishioners were ma- ins?
.uger, of ~ .liability, Sir A-1
Uirrie, and AlexanHor Hay «»i' n were proposed and apf>r*wjed for the •The minister called attention to the large •er of parisliionerf who were ill with bloody tnd in a starviii^. condition: that the sums \ ed at the chnrc-h doors were inadequate to present necemities, and proposed that a charge of 40 .shillings be made upon those who desired to i ..ho. church U41 rung at the tiimi of funerals as •ioa*» in other parishes. Tfcai wm agreed to Anotb?r expedient to hicre*2i« tb^ p**!^ mont-y U-- v>r perriiWSK^i ••<•• *
MEMORIAL STONE WHERE QUEEN MARY SURRENDERED.
SEVENTEENTH CENTURY RECORDS. 145
" with lettering." But even when pinched to make ends meet, practical help was extended to others beyond the parish. Dec. 28, 1675. — A contri- bution of £11, 10s. was made by the landward, and £29, 17s. lOd. by the burgh for the brunt houses at Newbattle.
Feb. 1, 1676. — The qlk day there was a letter sent to Mr Rob. Jossy to produce a testimonial from the next kirk parish, called St. Cuthbert's kirk, under the minister's hand, etc. This affords an idea how large an area Inveresk had included at that date.
May 2, 1676. — In intimating the Communion the elders are desyred be the Minister to reconcile people who are known to be at variance. At one time a collection was made for the people of Glasgow, at another for Kilmarnock, for Ormiston, for Newbattle, for a bridge at Coldstream, for the repair of Peterhead harbour, for poor people burnt out of their homes in Newbigging.
These contributions were ordered to be made by the Session, Presbytery, Synod, Privy Council or Parliament.
K
XIII.
PARISH FINANCE— XVII. CENTURY.
HE careful attention given to the administra- tion of monies entrusted to Kirk-Sessions for the use of the poor, and to the general finance of the parish, is well seen in a volume of accounts which cover the fourteen years from 1655 to 1669. In these a regular system of book-keeping is followed, and the receipts and disbursements are set down distinctly. Towards the close of each year new Treasurers were elected by the Session for the landward and burghal portions of the parish, who entered upon office as on the first of January, but did not intromit with any monies till an audit of the preceding treasurers' books had been made. At these audits an abstract of the retiring treasurers' accounts was drawn up and recorded, followed by an enumera- tion of the securities for money at interest, and all else for which the newly appointed treasurers would be held responsible. For example, at the installation of treasurers for 1665 on January 19 146
PARISH FINANCE — XVII. CENTURY. 147
it is thus entered : — Burgh Compts. Iniprimus Johne Smart, Thesaurer, is charged with ye col- lections for ye poore for ye year 1654, wch extends to . . 286 lib. 12 8
It w& penalties, pands esigned and
lost and annual rents, extends to
the soume of .182 lib. 2 0
Sumraa of his charge is . 468 lib. 14 8
His discharge, given out for sup- plying ye poore for ye year 1654
extends to . . 364 lib. 14 0
It for repairing ye kirk which was
summed, at ye easter loft, ye pillar
of repentance, the place for bap- tisms . . 90 lib. 0 0 Summa is . .454 lib. 14 0 So rests of frie money, which the
said Johne is to give in to Richard
Calderwood, Thesaurer for ye year
1655 the soume off . 14 lib. 0 8