ANNIVERSARY ADDRESS 227 



A new era opens with the advent of John Meikle, the 

 first great Scottish bellfounder. Son to John 

 John /Vleikle, Meikle, a Burgess of Musselburgh, in Octo- 

 an eminent ber, 1664, he first appears as an apprentice, 

 Edinburgh being " booked to George Anderson, copper- 

 Bellfounder. smith, Edinburgh." Later in life he acquired 

 the art of bell founding, and cannon casting, 

 in the Low Countries. Meikle was a strong supporter of 

 the Court party, and such was his skill that the Scots 

 Parliament, in 1686, passed a special Act in his favour, 

 granting him a monopoly of the trade. He died at Edin- 

 burgh, in 1704, Deacon of the craft of Hammermen, and 

 left £140 Scots to the poor of that Incorporation, hence his 

 name still figures in gold among their list of benefactors in 

 the Magdalene chapel. His foundry stood on the Edin- 

 burgh Castlehill. It was he who recast " Kate Kennedy y 

 the great bell which hangs in the tower of St. Salvator's 

 College, St. Andrews, so nick-named because dedicated 

 to St. Catherine, and gifted by Bishop Kennedy, 1460. 

 It is now disused, having been cracked by an Indian club, 

 wielded by a vandal student in wanton mischief Meikle's 

 chef d'oeuvre was the now scattered chime of St. Giles, 

 immortalised in Marmiov. A truant boy, bird-nesting 

 among the broom on Blackford Hill, Walter Scott lay and 

 listened : — 



" While rose on breezes thin, 

 The murmur of the city crowd, 

 And from his steeple jingling loud 

 Saint Giles's minglino^ din." 



Many parishes on the Borders are still 

 Border Bells gig^^^^ned with the tones of Meikle's bells. 



„ . Under shelter of the statute of 1686, his 



Foundry. i ^ x- i 



patrons were many and great, tor example : 



1692. — At Jedburgh, in the Town steeple : 



ROBERT . LORD . JEDBURO . HIS GIFT TO THE KIRK OF JED- 

 BURG. 1692. JOHN . MEIKLE . ME . FECIT . EDINBURGI. 



This bell bears the arms of Lord Jedburgh, with two 

 roe-bucks as supporters, and the motto ^^ Forward." 

 cc 



