406 State of Aris, Manners, &c. 
buildings, too, like the Inns of Court in 
London, contain a number of houfes or 
ftories, one over another, and occupied by 
feparate families, under one roof ; an ar- 
rangement much le{s convenient in {everal 
refpects, and efpecially lefs favourable to 
cleanlinefs, and to the eafy fupply of wa- 
ter, than where each building is, from top 
to bottom, deltined to. ferve only as one 
houfe and for a fingle family. 
The High ftreet, about a mile in length, 
from, the Caftle-hill to the Abbey, forms 
the principal part of the Old Town. Its 
width and the loftinefs of its edifices on 
both fides, give it, to the mind efpecially 
of an unprejudiced ftranger from England, 
an afpeét of dignity and ancient grandeur 
{carce to be equalled by the effeét of any 
other ftreet in Great Britain. The houfes 
are built of ftone, and covered on the 
roofs with flates. The walls are uncom- 
monly ftrong. Each. houfe refembles the 
keep of an ancient caftle. In front, thefe 
dwellings rife almoft every where to the 
height of five or fix ftories. But, as the 
fore-grouxd is the fummit of the ridge— 
he back-ground, but the fteep defcent of 
its fides;—fome of the fame buildings 
which appear in front only five or fix 
ftories high, are, on the oppofite fide, not 
~.Jefs in-height, than nine, ten, or eleven 
ftories:r Lateral wyzds or ftreets, at right 
angles with the High-ftreet, defcend, on 
the north-fide, to the brink of that which 
was, forty years fince, the Nortd Loch; 
on the fouth-fide, to the Cowgate. Thetle 
wynds aré exceedingly narrow and incon- 
venient. Their houles are lofty, in many 
infances ruinous, tenanted chiefly by the 
poor, and onthe ground and in the upper- 
ftories by the moft wretched part of thefe. 
The Crus in the midit of the High -ftreet, 
was once a curious Gothic monumental 
ftructure, but exifts now only in a coarfe 
Mofaic work in the pavement. Con- 
ticuous to it, on the north fide, is the 
Royal Exchangé, a {mall {quare of not in- 
convenient buildings, with a piazza, which 
was, about the middle of the laft century, 
ercétéd to favour the bufinefs-meetings of 
the merchants. The buildings of the 
: Parliament-fquare, almoft a century and 
a helt older than thofe of the Royal Ex- 
change, ftand nearly oppofite, on the 
fouth-fide of the Crofs.. They confitof 
the Parliament houfe, a {pacious edifice, 
in the different apartments of which, the 
Courts of Juftice have their feats—of 
feveral churches—of a banking-houfe, be- 
jonging <o Forbes, Hunter and Co.—and 
of fhops with chambers above, occupied 
by gold{miths, bookfellers, lawyers, &c, 
in Edinburgh and Leith. [Dec. 1, 
The Canongate, properly:a fuburb, and 
in old times the court-end of the town, 
contains a number of good old houfes and 
gardens which wefe once occupied ‘by the 
chief nobility and gentry of the kingdom. 
‘The Palace of Holyrood-houfe is a vene- 
rable and {pacious quadrangular edifice, 
not unworthy of the Kings for whofe. re- 
fidence it was deftined. James the Seventh, 
when Duke of York, was the laft fovereiga 
of thefe kingdoms who refided in this 
palace, His grandfon, the Pretender 
Charles, held here, for a few days, his 
mimic-court, in the year 1745. It was 
lately, for fome time, the afylum of the. 
head of the exiled Royal Family of France. 
Several of the Scottifh nobility have, by — 
the King’s favour, apartments in Holy- 
rood-houfe. The Caftle is Rrong by its 
natural fituation, and by the fortifications 
which it comprehends. Confiderable quan- 
tities of military ftores of all forts are 
depofited in its Even in time of peace, a 
battalion or two of troops ufually lie in 
its garrifon; and the Lieutenant-go-. 
vernor is almoft conftantly refident. The 
declivity between the ftreet named the 
Cowgate, and the ancient fouthern limits 
of the town, is occupied by lateral ftreets, 
by fome new fquares, by one or two in- 
fulated manfions, by the High School, the 
Infirmary, the College, and one or two 
other public buildings. Weftward is the 
Grafs-market, in which hay, ftraw, 
grain, fheep, horfes, cows, and oxen have 
long been expofed to public fale;—-Heriot’s 
Hofpital, a noble charitable foundation, of 
which the revenues have not been per~ 
‘verted from the juit, original purpofes ;—~ 
and, in the midft of an extenfive burying= 
ground, that venerable religious ftruéture, 
the Grey Friar’s-church. Many of the 
old buildings in this part of Edinburgh 
are continually ina ftate of dilapidation 
and renewal. Theold caftellated ftruéture. 
gives place ftill more and more to a 
lighter, .cleanlier, ahd more ccmmo- 
dious plan of building.—But, perhaps an- 
other century. may elapfe ere the Old 
Town of Edinburgh fhall be, in all its 
parts,completely accommedated to the mo- 
dern methods of living and of trading in- 
cuftry, It was when every town was, as 
it were, but the enlarged bas-cour of a 
caftle, when people crowded within the 
walls for protection againft hoftility, that, 
in order to afford dwellings to as numerous 
a population as might be, the fafhion of 
raifing houles like thofe at Edinburgh be- 
gan. It was continued here, from ule, 
and on account of the advantage which was 
found in fnsring the privileges of burgeffes, 
he 
