Series 1 > Tours in Scotland 1747, 1750, 1760

188
TOUR THROUGH SCOTLAND, 1760.
Letter XXXVII.
Elgin,/*//?/ . . . 1760.
Dear Sister,—From Spigny we came two short miles to
Elgin situated between low hills on the small river Lossie ; The
town chiefly consists of a broad street half a mile long; in the
middle of which is the large parish Church dedicated to their
Patron St Giles whose figure is the Arms of the town. There
are about 3000 Souls in it, they have a manufacture of Linnen
yarn, and some linnen, blankets, and coarse cloath, mostly for
home consumption. They have also a good Market and Shops.
Bishop Andrew of the Duffus family, obtained from Alex¬
ander the first the ground on the river to the East of the town
for the site of a Cathedral which he built, and it was conse¬
crated in 1224. The Towers are at the West End, & the
Transcept seems to be of the old building, being of a plainer
and heavier Gothic Architecture than the rest of the building.
For in 1390 Alexander Earl of Buchan, called the Wolf of
Badenoch, burnt the town of Elgin, particularly the Cathedral,
St. Giles’s Church, the Maison de Dieu, and 18 houses of Canons
and Chaplains; for which when he was absolved from his
Excommunication, he made the best restitution he could : when
Bishop Leighton came to the See in 1414 he gave a third of his
Bishoprick to build the Cathedral Church, and ’tis said all the
Chapter did the same: And then it is to be supposed this
beautifull Cathedral1 was begun, the Ornaments of which show
that Arts had begun to revive. The west door is extremely
fine, consists of thirty members of round pillars, fillets and
flutes; There are two door places in it which are all adorned
inside and outside with most elegant open carved work; over
the middle is a compartment in which they say there was
a Crucifix, there is a Nich on each side, and one over each of
them. ’Tis said in these were the statues of St. Peter and St.
Paul, and over the point of the arch in the middle compart-
1 See Shaw’s History of the Promnce of Moray, 1775 ; Pennant’s Tour, 1769,
p. 162 ; Cordiner’s Antiq. of Scot., 1776, p. 57 ! Forsyth’s Survey of the Province
of Moray, 1798 ; Rhind and Alexander’s Sketches of Moray, 1839.