[153] Bishop Forbes inserts in his manuscript (which I possess) a panegyrical epitaph for Ned Burke, stating that he died in Edinburgh in November 1751. He also gives the following particulars from Burke’s conversation:
‘One of the soles of Ned’s shoes happening to come off, Ned cursed the day upon which he should be forced to go without shoes. The Prince, hearing him, called to him and said: “Ned, look at me”—when (said Ned) I saw him holding up one of his feet at me, where there was de’il a sole upon the shoe; and then I said: “Oh, my dear! I have nothing more to say. You have stopped my mouth indeed.”
‘When Ned was talking of seeing the Prince again, he spoke these words: “If the Prince do not come and see me soon, good faith I will go and see my daughter [Charles having taken the name of Betty Burke when in a female disguise], and crave her; for she has not yet paid her christening money, and as little has she paid the coat I ga’e her in her greatest need.”’
[154] ‘Upon the 26th of February [1617], the Cross of Edinburgh was taken down. The old long stone, about forty footes or thereby in length, was to be translated, by the devise of certain mariners in Leith, from the place where it had stood past the memory of man, to a place beneath in the High Street, without any harm to the stone; and the body of the old Cross was demolished, and another builded, whereupon the long stone or obelisk was erected and set up, on the 25th day of March.’—Calderwood’s Church History.
[155] See Domestic Annals of Scotland, ii. 436.
[156] Waverley Annotations, i. 435.
[157] What is said to be the original Blue Blanket is still preserved in the National Museum of Antiquities of Scotland.
[158] Scots Magazine, June 1767.
[159] The skeleton of this singular being exists entire in the class-room of the professor of anatomy in the College.
[160] Notes to Waverley.