It is first mentioned in the year 1359, in a charter of David II. In 1466, it was made a collegiate church, and no fewer than forty altars were at this period supported within its walls. The Scottish poet, Gavin Douglas, (the translator of Virgil,) was for some time Provost of St. Giles. After the Reformation it was partitioned into four places of worship, and the sacred vessels and relics which it contained, including the arm-bone referred to in the preceding note, were seized by the Magistrates of the City, and the proceeds of their sale applied to the repairing of the building. In 1603, before the departure of James VI. to take possession of the throne of England, he attended divine service in this church, after which he delivered a farewell address to his Scottish subjects, assuring them of his unalterable affection. "His words were often interrupted by the tears of the whole audience, who, though they exulted at the King's prosperity, were melted into sorrow by these tender declarations."* On the 13th October 1643, the Solemn League and Covenant was sworn to and subscribed within its walls by the Committee of Estates of Parliament, the Commission of the Church, and the English Commission. The Regent Murray and the Marquis of Montrose are interred near the centre of the south side of the church, and on the outside of its northern wall is the monument of Napier of Merchiston, the inventor of logarithms. The cathedral is now divided into three places of worship, viz. the High Church, the Tolbooth Church, and a Hall, originally intended for the meetings of the General Assembly, but which, after its completion, was found to be unfit for the purpose. In the High Church the Magistrates of the City, and the Judges of the Court of Session, attend divine service in their official robes. The patronage of these, as well as of all the other city parish churches, is vested in the tion, the magistrates of the city, in 1454, considering that the said bone was 'freely left to oure moyer kirk of Saint Gele of Edinburgh, withoutyn ony condition makyn,' granted a charter in favour of Mr. Preston's heirs, by which the nearest heir of the name of Preston was entitled to the honour of carrying it in all public processions. This honour the family of Preston continued to enjoy till the Reformation.-Picture of Edinburgh, p. 217. * ROBERTSON's History of Scotland. Magistrates and Town Council. The remains of John Knox, the intrepid Ecclesiastical Reformer, were deposited in the cemetery of St. Giles, which formerly occupied the ground where the buildings of the Parliament Square now stand. So lately as the year 1817, all the spaces between the buttresses of the church were occupied by small shops called the krames, grafted upon the walls of the building; the unholy fires of the shopkeepers begriming with their smoke the whole external surface of the sacred edifice. The annexed engraving represents this curious alliance between the sacred and profane, while the wood-cut introduced into the text exhibits the building in its present state. With the exception of the spire, the whole of the external walls of the cathedral have in recent years been renovated—a circumstance which has materially impaired the venerable aspect of the building. In the centre of the Parliament Square, of which the Cathedral just described may be said to form the northern side, stands THE EQUESTRIAN STATUE of Charles II., which, in vigour of design and general effect, still maintains its rank as the best specimen of bronze statuary which Edinburgh possesses. The Chambers of the Court of Exchequer, the Parliament House, and the Libraries of the Faculty of Advocates and of the Writers to the Signet, form the eastern, western, and southern sides of the Square. THE PARLIAMENT HOUSE is situated in the south-west angle. The large hall, now known by the name of the Outer-House, is the place in which the Scottish Parliament met before the Union. This hall is 122 feet long by 49 broad. Its roof is of oak, arched and handsomely finished. It contains two statues—one of Henry Dundas, the first Lord Melville, and the other of that eminent lawyer, Lord President Blair, who died in 1811. At the south end of the Outer-House are four small chambers or Courts, in which the Lords Ordinary sit. Entering from the east side, are two larger Courts of modern and elegant structure, appropriated to the First and Second Divisions of |