Spread along the sandy margin of one of our noblest rivers, and nestling under the brow of a green and conical mountain, it was without walls in the year 1488; but at each end had a strongly embattled gate, which defended it on the east and west, while its castle, of the eleventh century, which stood on an immense mass of steep rock that overlooked the Tay, gave it additional strength, and added a military character to the naval importance which the burgh was acquiring by the shipping that usually crowded its harbour. This castle is now removed, and a broad street has been hewn through the heart of the rock which it crowned.
Its quaint thoroughfares contained then many beautiful chapels, convents, and monasteries; and the stately hotel of many a noble family, with turrets and turnpike-stair, embattled porch, and armorial bearings. These towered above the timber-fronted and arcaded houses of the Fluckergaitt, the Overgaitt, and other venerable streets, whose appearance was more picturesque than their names would import. There our kings had a mansion named the Whitehall, the vaults of which are yet remaining; as also had the Lords Drummond, the Scrimegeours of Dudhope, the Barons of Strathmartine, the powerful Earls of Angus, and the great Earl of Crawford, who, for his valour at Blackness, in the recent struggle between the king and nobility, had been created Duke of Montrose, and Lord High Chamberlain of Scotland. Many great barons of the Carse of Gowrie also resided in Dundee, where Parliaments and Conventions have been held; and which could then boast of the Mint of King Robert I., and the palace of St. Margaret, the Queen of Malcolm III.; but its proudest objects were that broad river, which from the hills of Strathfillan and Glendochart rolls its mighty current to the German Sea; and its ample harbour, crowded by the high-pooped and gaudily-painted ships of France and Norway, Sweden and Flanders.
On the afternoon of this bright Beltane day, the return of the great naval hero from the shores of Flanders caused an unusual commotion and satisfaction in Dundee. The whole inhabitants were "on tiptoe," and a joyous murmur spread along the Mole when the well-known caravels of Wood were seen to enter the river; for now, though the admiral was a knight and baron of Parliament, who fought under the king's pennon, he still dabbled a little in merchandise, which gave him additional value in the estimation of the thrifty burgesses and merchant traders of the town. Thus, every ship in the harbour, from the great argosie that traded with the Levant, down to those little crayers or low-built smacks which are still peculiar to the Scottish firths, hoisted her colours. The bells in the vast tower of St. Mary rang a merry peal; groups of old weather-beaten tars, wearing broad blue bonnets, gaberdines of Galloway white, and enormous boots of rough skin, assembled on the rock of St. Nicholas, and on the Mole, which then lay to the westward thereof, to observe, and exercise their nautical criticism on the aspect of the tall ships which, before a gentle eastern breeze, were slowly coming abreast of the town. There are bluff old fellows of this kind—half man and half fish—who, in all ages, have haunted the piers of seaport towns, and are great, pugnacious, and, moreover obstinate authorities, in all matters appertaining unto salt water.
Amid all the dense population so interested in the arrival of the admiral, there were none who bent their eyes more eagerly on the coming ships than five fair young girls who were seated on the bartizan of a large mansion, which (after surviving nearly all its baronial cotemporaries) still stands at the corner of Fish-street, and the Flesher-row, which were then, as they are yet, the busiest part of all Dundee, and contained some of the finest examples of old Scottish street architecture.
This mansion is large and square, like a great bastel-house; and at three of its corners has broad round towers, which are strong enough to turn cannon balls. The whole superstructure rests on an arcade composed of finely-moulded elliptical arches, that spring from fluted pilasters.* Its arcade is partly sunk into the earth, and it is further diminished of its original height by a slate roof sloping down upon the walls, which of old were surmounted by a bartizan, from whence a view could be obtained of the river to the south, and that quaint old thoroughfare to the west, where, two hundred years before, the schoolboy William Wallace, slew the son of Selby, the English governor; but to the north the lofty mansions of the Nethergaitt shut out the view.
* In 1808, two hundred silver coins of James VI. were found imbedded in the wall of this fabric, which is now named King James's Custom House, from the use to which it was last applied.
In the time of our history, this stately mansion, the stone panels of which were covered by coats-of-arms bearing a Sleuth-hound and shield, with three bars wavy, was the town residence of one of Scotland's most powerful peers, John, Lord Drummond, of Stobhall and that ilk, who was Baron of Concraig, Steward of Strathearn, Privy Councillor, and had been Ambassador of James III. to England, three years before, concerning the marriage of James, the young Duke of Rothesay, to a princess of that kingdom; an embassy on which he mysteriously failed.
The five fair girls who were watching the ships' approach on this bright summer evening, were his daughters, now left entirely to their own control; for Lord Drummond was with the king at Scone, and their mother, Elizabeth Lindesay, of the princely House of Crawford, had been dead three years, and lay entombed in Dunblane.
Euphemia was twenty years of age; her sisters, Sybilla and Margaret, were respectively nineteen and eighteen; but Elizabeth and Beatrix were little girls, and of them cotemporary history has recorded little more than the names.
Lady Euphemia was a very handsome girl, with fine hazel eyes, and glossy dark brown hair, which was entirely confined in one of those cauls of gold net by which the Scottish ladies had gladly superseded the fontanges of the preceding reign. Over this floated a white kerchief of the finest texture, edged with gold fringe. Her nose was straight; her well-defined eyebrows expressed decision; her complexion was clear, but pale; her bust and figure were unexceptionable, and the very elegant costume of the court of James III.—an ermined jacquette of black velvet, with spangled skirtle and yellow mantle, displayed them to the best advantage. She wore scarlet gloves from Perth, and shoes of crimson tissue. Her whole appearance was gaudy and brilliant; while her air was lofty and reserved, for it was an age when pride of birth and station were carried to an absurd extent; but in her beauty there was something noble and majestic; and her dark hair imparted to her skin a pure and transparent whiteness that was very striking, even in a land of fair women.