48 ROYAL STUART RELICS. 



have been looked upon with still greater curiosity and 

 attention. " Old Aberdeen/' seeking purity of morals, 

 and trying to wash her citizens clean of the " pockis," 

 " French infirmitez," and other perilous stuff, by burgh 

 edicts and excommunications, little dreamt that she 

 was contending with an old enemy in the land — 

 Satanic if not Spanish. Whether the " distemper " was 

 old or new, Goodsir's diagnosis proved his surgical 

 acumen, and showed how keenly alive he was to the 

 science of medicine in all its aspects. To-day a rage 

 for the exploration of barrows and the fingering of 

 crania exists in Britain, but instead of having guides 

 of the Goodsir stamp, divinity talkers, and credulous 

 connoisseurs — men without anatomical knowledge or 

 a comprehension of the difficulties attending anthro- 

 pological pursuits — fearlessly "rush in where angels 

 fear to tread." Quousque tandem f The exploring of 

 barrows led David Page (now LL.D. and the distin- 

 guished President of the Geological Society of Edin- 

 burgh) and others to excavate the burial-ground of the 

 ancient Abbey of St. Leonards at St. Andrews, where 

 they discovered a cranium of one of the "Koyal Stuarts." 

 " The divinity that doth hedge about a king " did not 

 protect this cranium from Goodsir's manipulation and 

 mouldings. Others quarried for the treasures ; Goodsir 

 described them. The desecration of the supposed 

 tombs of the Scottish kings got noised abroad, and 

 gave rise to official remonstrance and interdict. 



Mr. Goodsir read a variety of essays on Natural 

 history to the society at St. Andrews, and at the re- 



