102 SCOTLAND ILLUSTRATED. 



" Here still, as time rolls on, with brighter ray 

 May science beam ; and learning's ripening day 

 Fling new effulgence o'er that sacred Dome, 

 Where Truth is shrined, and Freedom guards her home 1" ' 



The High School, the Edinburgh Academy, and various other seminaries of 

 education for which the capital is so happily distinguished, are ably conducted 

 in all that relates to ancient and modern learnuig, as well as the mculcation 

 of religious principle and social duties. But in this " modern Athens" — a name 

 given to it not more from its external than its intellectual resemblance to the 

 ancient capital of Attica — not a street could be pointed out in which learning 

 has not established her sanctuary,* however humble or obscure. 



The facility of acquiring, under these circumstances, an excellent education, 

 ensures its easy transmission. Where personal merits are measured by the 

 weight of personal acquirements, a healthy emulation is kept up among the 

 yoimg, and a desire on the part of the old that their sons and daughters may be 

 early imbued with what their own experience has told them was better than 

 the gifts of fortune. 



In respect to establishments for the poor, and the means afforded for the 

 recovery of health, Edinburgh enjoys a happy preeminence over most other 

 capitals in Europe. This is the consequence, partly, of her celebrated School 

 of Medicine, which leaves so much talent at the disposal of charitable purposes 

 and persons ; and partly to the patriotic spirit which has so often manifested 

 itself in Uberal donations and bequeathments for the alleviation of suffering 

 and privation. f The County Hospital, or Royal Infirmary, has been long 

 celebrated for the skill and humanity of its medical officers, to which every 

 succeeding year contributes some fresh testimony.t 



Heriot's Hospital — a magnificent and richly endowed institution — reminds us, 

 in point of external design and embellishment, of some of the more elaborate 

 structures of Italy. It was built by George Heriot, a native of Haddington- 

 shire, and goldsmitli to James VI., at an expense of thirty thousand paunds.§ 



• Among the higher institutions of a similar tendency— namely, the diffusion of general knowledge — are the 

 Wernerian, Natural History, the Speculative, the Royal Medical and Physical, Caledonian, Horticultural. 

 Scottish Academy, Highland, and Astronomical Societies, with thirty others of various importance. 



t For many interesting particulars, the reader is referred to " Walks in Edinburgh ;" " Keith's and 

 Arnol's Hist." " Traditions of Edinburgh,'' &c. 



J To this may be ailded, the Public Dispensary, the Lying-in and Surgical Hospitals, the Lunatic 

 Asylum, Charity Workhouse, Trinity Hospital, Asylum for the Blind, Deaf and Dumb Institution, Mag- 

 dalen Asylum, the Bridewell, Sec. 



§ The reader will romcmber the sobriquet applied to him by King James, as Jingling Geordie, in " The 

 Fortuiws of Nigel." He died in London, at his house in St. Martin's-in-the-Fields, universally respected. 



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