Imperial gazeteer of Scotland, or, Dictionary of Scottish topography > Volume 1

ABERDEEN.
9
ABERDEEN.
does so chiefly by its own power, or through the
effects of the industry and the arts of its citizens;
for it possesses none of the thrilling brilliance or
grand pieturesqueness of site and surrounding
scenery which distinguishes Inverness, Perth, Stir-
ling, Edinburgh, and so many other famous Scottish
towns. The approach to it by sea lies along a bleak
sandy coast, with low rocks and long reefs on the
foreground, and a tame unfeatured surface on the
background, and becomes interesting only at the
point of sudden ingress among the crowded ship-
ping of the harbour. The land approach from the
south, too, traverses a broad, low, moorish outskirt
of the Grampians, and is all utterly dismal till it
bursts at once on a near view of the Dee and the
citv. But the contrast there is most striking; and
an impression is instantly produced on an intelli-
gent stranger, which subsequent acquaintance with
the place thoroughly confirms, that wonders have
been worked by art both within the city and on the
surrounding soil. Three interesting walks, of four
or five miles each, may be had among the environs.
The first goes to Old Aberdeen, and up the Don,
past Grandholm and through Woodside, and returns
to the city by the Inverness road; the second goes
bv the Lunatic Asylum, on the north-west side of
the city, to the Stocket-hill, where the best view of
the city and the surrounding country is obtained,
and proceeds thence to the great granite quarries of
Rubislaw, and returns by the Skene turnpike road ;
and the third goes south-westward to the Old
Bridge of Dee, and passes down the right bank of
the Dee to G-irdleness lighthouse, and crosses by
the ferry to Footdee.
The first dwelling-houses of Aberdeen were pro-
bably a few rude huts near the spot where Trinity
church now stands. The ground next occupied
was probably in the neighbourhood of the castle
and the green ; and the town gradually extended in
the direction of the Ship-row, the Exchequer-row,
and the south side of Castlegate. But in the 14th
century the town was almost totally destroyed by
an English army under Edward III.; and a grand
extension of it then took place over the eminences of
Castle-hill, Port-hill, St. Catherine's-hill, and Wool-
man-hill; and this took the name of New Aberdeen,
not in contradistinction to the kirktown of Old
Machar, which now bears the name of Old Aber-
deen, but in contradistinction to the old town on the
Dee which the English had destroyed. Even the
new town, however, with the exception of its public
structures, was rude and insubstantial ; and not till
ages after did it acquire any regularity of alignment
or urbanity of appearance. In 1545 a stone edifice
was considered a mark of great opulence ; and so
late as 1741 the houses on the west side of the
Broadgate were constructed of wood. Westwards
of the Gallowgate, there was, till the latter part of
last century, a large fenny marsh, called the Loch,
which must have occupied a large portion of the
north-west quarter of the present city. The very
best streets, too, till then and afterwards, were nar-
row and unlevel, and had no better pavement than
a causeway of round stones; and the parts of the
town most favourable to drainage and ventilation
on the Den-burn and toward the south-west, were
huddlements of houses so chokingly close to one
another, and so abominably filthy, as to render it
difficult to conceive how they could be ever free
from pestilence; and the only egresses to the Dee
and to the north were by steep, rough, suffocating
thoroughfares, which persons accustomed to the
modern conveniences of the city would think it a
dire penance to go through. And even to the pre-
sent hour, indeed, there are remains of this state of
things within the city, in no fewer than about 60
narrow lanes, and no fewer than about 168 courts
or closes, of an average breadth of not more than
7 feet.;
But about the end of last century a great change
began; and it rapidly gave the city grand new fea-
tures, and at the same time set its finest old ones in
advantageous lights. First, a street was opened
from Broad-street to North-street, so as to form an
improved outlet to the north. Next, Marischal-
street was opened from Castle-street to the quay ;
and, though rather inconveniently steep, it is inter-
esting both for being still a great thoroughfare
from the centre of the city to the harbour, and for
being the first street in Aberdeen which was paved
with dressed stones. Next, a new and important
exit to the north-west was obtained by opening
George-street through the middle of the loch, to
communicate with a new turnpike road to Inverury.
Next, two grand new exits were made, from the
middle of the town at Castle-street, by respectively
Union-street to the south-west, and King-street to
the north, — two projects which were estimated by
the engineer to cost the town council about £42,000,
but which soon actually cost them £171,280, and
then involved them in bankruptcy. And contem-
poraneously with these, and also subsequently,
there were other great improvements which we
shall have occasion to glance at when noticing the
public buildings and the harbour.
The edifices of Aberdeen, both public and private,
are for the most part constructed of a wavy fine
granite from the neighbouring quarries; and those
of the modern and principal streets are so clean, so
massive, so uniformly surfaced, and reflect the light
so clearly from the glittering mica of the granite as
to look, on a sunny day, as if they had just been
hewn and polished from the rocks on which they
stand. Union-street is about a mile long, spacious,
straight, elegantly edificed, well-gemmed with pub-
lic buildings, and altogether one of the finest streets
of the empire; and at the same time runs on a
higher level than the portions of the town on its
southern flank, and looks over the tops of their
houses to a pleasant prospect of the south side of the
Dee. It is carried over two of the old streets of the
town, and over the ravine of the Den-burn, which
formerly caused vast inconvenience to the thorough-
fare; and there it is sustained by a magnificent bridge
of three arches, — two of them covered and concealed
and of 50 feet each in span, and the other open, 132
feet in span, and surmounted with cornice, parapet,
and balustrades. This bridge cost £13,342. St.
Nicholas-street leads airily from Union-street to
George-street on the north-west. Market-street is
wide, short, and moderately steep; leads direct
from Union-street to the harbour ; and, in 1865,
was in process of being built with houses of a
superior character. Castle-street is a large oblong
square, the Place of the City, rich in public orna-
mental structures, and taking its name from an
ancient fortress which stood on a rising ground on
its eastern side. King-street is little inferior in
splendour to Union-street, and has also several
handsome public buildings. Broad-street is the
site of Marischal college ; and the house in it, No.
64, was the residence of Lord Byron, while under
his mother's care. The other streets do not chal-
lenge particular notice, but may be described in
the aggregate as at least equal to the second and
the third class streets of most stone-built towns in
Britain.
The West and East churches stand on the north
side of Union-street, amid a cemetery of nearly two
acres in area, which is separated from the street by