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Beneath this chapel was the burial-place of the barons of Roslin; “so dry," fays Slezer in 1693, "that the bodies at the end of eighty years were found in it entire." Ten barons had been buried there before the revolution; and of old, fays Hay, << they were buried in their armour without any coffin. The first baron who was buried in a coffin was when the Duke of York, afterwards James II., was in Scotland. He and feveral antiquaries were oppofed to his having a coffin, but the widow insisted on it, declaring it to be beggarly to be buried without. The chapel," continues Hay, "of which any nation may be proud, was defaced by the fame ungoverned mob which pillaged the castle of Roflin, on the night of the 11th of December, 1688." The castle, after standing the fhocks of the reformation and the revolution, was at length refigned to time and chance. The chapel was repaired in the last century by General St. Clair; and has fince been renovated by his fucceffors.

We may rejoice that, notwithstanding the affaults and perils through which this beautiful chapel has paffed, in common with almost every ecclefiaftical building in Scotland, it remains so entire as it does. It is a fpecimen of the ecclefiaftical architecture of Scotland that is without peer. Outfide and infide it is a truly beautiful object. Its aifles on each fide are supported by rows of pointed arches, of which the pillars are not more than eight feet high, with clustered shafts of a maffiveness equalling the Saxon; and the arches themselves richly ornamented in fucceffive corded bands, or spandrels. The capitals of the pillars are also elaborately carved in foliage intermingled with figures. One pillar has a renown of its own. It is called the 'prentice pillar, the legend being that the apprentice of the architect executed this in his master's absence, and when he returned and faw its furpaffing beauty,

he knocked out the lad's brains with his hammer. The figure of the 'prentice is pointed out on the top of another pillar, and not far off is a buft, faid to be that of his mother, who is looking at his dead body and weeping. The pillar is of exquifite workmanship, being covered with the most delicate tracery, which runs spirally round it. Such a legend is not con

ROSLIN 'PRENTICE PILLAR.

fined to Roflin; there is a 'prentice pillar in one of the churches at Rouen, and of a fimilar nature is the legend of the celebrated astronomical clock in Strasburg Cathedral, that the inventor had no fooner completed it than the corporation had his eyes put out, that he might not make another like it.

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On the pavement of the chapel is the outline of one of the barons, lying in effigy, with a greyhound at his feet. Nothing is more common than for some animal, the chief cognizance of the family, to be thus placed at the feet of knight or baron. "But in this cafe," fays Robert Chambers, "it has given rife to a peculiar ftory, which is thus related to all vifitors by the person who now shows the chapel. The perfon here delineated," he says, "is Sir William de St. Clair. He was one day hunting over Roflin Moor along with King Robert Bruce, when a white deer was started. Roflin wagered his head that his excellent hounds Hold and Help would feize the deer before it could cross the March Burn. It was just about to do so, without being feized, when Roflin's emergency made. him at once pious and poetical. He vowed a chapel to St. Katherine, provided fhe would take his cafe in hand, and fhouted out to the foremost of his dogs :

'Help, haud, an' ye may,

Or Roflin will lose his head this day.'

Help, affifted by the faint, and encouraged by her master, made a desperate leap forward, and pulled down the deer just as it was about to leap upon land. The baron, too much terrified by the risk to enjoy the escape, immediately put his foot upon the dog's neck, and killed it, faying it should never again lead him into fuch temptation." It used to be a belief in the neighbourhood that, on the night before any of the barons died, the whole of the chapel appeared in flames. In 1805, the Marchionefs of Stafford took fome sketches of Roflin Chapel, which were etched in 1807, and circulated in a small volume amongst her friends.

Roflin Castle, overhanging the picturesque glen of the Esk, is, as we have said, a ruin, with a modern house built in the midst of it; but the three lower ftories, being below the

level of the fummit of the bank, are yet entire. A beautiful Scottish song, bearing its name, has connected its memory with the public mind, far and wide.

ROSLIN CASTLE.

[By Richard Hewitt, a native of Cumberland, who acted as conductor to Dr. Blacklock, the blind Scottish poet, and died in 1764. It is always included among the Scottish fongs. The air is Scotch, and very beautiful.]

'Twas in that season of the year,

When all things gay and sweet appear,
That Colin, with the morning ray,
Arofe and fung his rural lay.
Of Nancy's charms the shepherd fung,
The hills and dales with Nancy rung,
While Roflin Castle heard the swain,
And echoed back the cheerful strain.

Awake, fweet Muse! the breathing spring
With rapture warms; awake and fing!
Awake and join the rural throng,
Who hail the morning with a fong:
To Nancy raise the cheerful lay,
O bid her hafte and come away;
In sweetest smiles herself adorn,
And add new graces to the morn.

O! hark, my love, on every spray
Each feathered warbler tunes his lay,
'Tis beauty fires the ravished throng,
And love inspires the melting song;
Then let my raptured notes arife,
For beauty darts from Nancy's eyes,
And love my rifing bosom warms,
And fills my foul with sweet alarms.

O! come, my love; thy Colin's lay

With rapture calls-O! come away!

Come while the mufe this wreath fhall twine

Around that modest brow of thine:

O! hither hafte, and with thee bring
That beauty blooming like the fpring,
Those graces that divinely shine,

And charm this ravished breaft of mine!

It would leave but a very imperfect idea of Roflin and its locality, did we omit to mention that near it stands Hawthornden, the house of the poet Drummond, the friend of Shakspeare and Ben Jonfon. We believe the place is ftill in the poffeffion of a defcendant of the family.

It ftands on a precipitous rock overhanging the fouth bank of the river. We cannot do better than transcribe the account of it given by Robert Chambers, in his "Picture of Scotland."

"Hawthornden may be described as a manor-house of the reign of Charles I., engrafted on the ruins of an ancient baronial castle. On one fide its walls rise directly from the brink of a deep precipice; on the other, they adjoin to a level and well-cultivated domain. The walks around the house are peculiarly fine, being chiefly laid throughout the beautiful vale of the Efk. Admiffion to them can only be obtained by an order from the proprietor.

“What must add greatly to the charm of Hawthornden, is, that the present house was built by the poet: as is teftified by an infcription on the front. Many of the minor localities. around the house are affociated with his name; as an arbour where he used to fit at his long daily mufings, and a summerhouse where he is faid to have often taken his food. But perhaps the most interesting of all the neighbouring objects, is a large tree near the place where the external gate of the court-yard formerly ftood-a tree which seems to have acted the part of the Covin tree. This Covin or Coglin tree stood in front of old mansion-houses in Scotland, and to it the host attended his guests bare-headed on their departure.

"Ben Jonson, it is generally known, walked all the way from London on foot to fee Drummond at this his paternal refidence. Regarding this vifit, tradition records a circumstance so characteristic and fo probable, that I can not but believe it

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