Each of the windows of Heriot’s hospital is remarkable for being ornamented in a different manner, with the exception of two on the west side whereon the carvings exactly agree. The north gate is adorned with wreathed columns, and devices representing the modes of working in the business of a jeweller and goldsmith.[204]
Heriot’s boys, with a daring which seems to require some check, on account of its risk, and the injury it must necessarily occasion in the course of time, have a practice of climbing this front by grasping the carvings. The insecurity of this progress to a fearful eminence, has surprised and alarmed many a spectator “frae the south.”
Inscriptions of various benefactions are placed in the council-room. There is one which records the liberality of a well-known gentleman, viz.
1804
Dr. John Gilchrist,
several Years Professor of
the Hindostanee Language in the
College of Fort William, Bengal,
presented 100l. sterling
to this Hospital,
as a small testimony
of Gratitude for
his Education in so
valuable a Seminary.
There are several engravings of his portrait. One of them by J. Moffat, Edinburgh, engraved in 1820, after a picture by Scougal, in the council-room of the edifice, is inscribed “George Heriot, Jeweller to King James VI., who, besides founding and endowing his stately hospital at Edinburgh, bequeathed to his relations above 60,000l. sterling. Obiit. 1623. Ætatis Anno 63.” His arms on this print are surmounted by the motto, “I distribute cheerfully.”
In the “Fortunes of Nigel,” by the author of “Waverely,” Heriot is introduced, with a minute description of his dress and person, seemingly derived from real data, whereas there is little other authority for such markings, than the imagination of the well-known “Great Unknown.”
The striking magnificence of Heriot’s hospital is recorded by an expression of too great force to be strictly accurate. It was observed by a foreigner, before the palace of Holyrood-house was built by Charles II., that there was at Edinburgh a palace for beggars, and a dungeon for kings.[205]