The Ports, Harbours, Watering-places and Picturesque Scenery of Great Britain Vol. 1

It was inferior, perhaps, in architectural elegance to Melrose, Elgin, and some others; but, with the exception of Holyrood, it was probably the most wealthy monastic establishment in Scotland. The monks did not exceed twenty-five in number; and some idea may be formed of the abbot's charity and hospitality from this fact, that one of the orders issued for the yearly provision of the abbey is thus particularized: – eight hundred wedder sheep, one hundred and eighty oxen, eleven barrels of salmon, twelve hundred and five dried cod-fish, eighty-two chalders of malt, thirty chalders of wheat, and forty chalders of meal; these supplies, it is to be observed, were in addition to the rents paid in kind by the abbot's tenants.

The Abbey of Arbroath appears to have been demolished some time previously to the general destruction of the religious houses at the Reformation. Tradition ascribes its early fate to a quarrel between the monks and Ochterlony, Laird of Kelly, at whose instigation a lawless mob attacked and set fire to the abbey, till the neighbouring streets, it is said, "were deluged with the melted lead that streamed from its roof."

After the destruction and spoliation of the abbey, Arbroath lost all its importance as a royal burgh, and continued in a very depressed state till the building of the new pier, when commerce began to repair the loss and recover some portion of its ancient prosperity. The population is about 7000, or upwards.

MONTROSE

"Mare ditat: Rosa decorat."

"Montrose – a beauty that lies concealed, as it were, in the bosom of Scotland; most delicately dressed up, and adorned with excellent buildings, whose foundations are laid with polished stone, and her ports all washed with silver streams that trickle down from the famous Ask." – Richard Frank, A.D. 1658.

Montrose, a royal burgh and sea-port town of Forfarshire, is agreeably situated on a level plain, or peninsula, bounded on the north-east by the German Ocean, on the south by the river South Esk, and on the west by a large expanse of this river, called the Basin of Montrose. The erection of this town into a royal burgh has generally been referred to the year 1352, being the twenty-third of the reign of David II.; but it appears to have been a place of some note long before it acquired this dignity, and is connected with many important events in the history of Scotland. It is mentioned by Froissart, as the port from which the gallant Sir James Douglas embarked in 1330, for the Holy Land, attended by a numerous and splendid retinue, and carrying with him the heart of King Robert Bruce. This, as the reader knows, was in execution of the last charge committed to him by his royal master, namely, to carry the heart of the deceased monarch to Jerusalem, and there deposit it in the holy sepulchre. The disastrous failure of this pious enterprise is too well known to require further notice in this place.

The principal manufactures carried on in Montrose are the spinning and weaving of flax. For this purpose there are several steam-mills for spinning, and one on the North Esk driven by water. These steam-mills produce annually upwards of 800,000 spindles. There are also in the town soap, starch, rope, and sail manufactories; and others for making steam-machinery. Ship-building is carried on to a considerable extent, and there is a patent slip, introduced for repairing ships. There are also in addition various breweries, tan-works, candle-works, a foundry, and a steam-mill for grinding meal and flour.

Montrose is the port of the Custom-house, and, as such, comprehends within its bounds all that district between the lights of Tay on the south, and the Todhead on the north, thereby including Arbroath, and other places of less importance.

The principal foreign imports into Montrose consist of flax, hemp, tallow, whale-fins and oil, fir-timber, oak and oak-planks, deal and deal-ends. But as the goods manufactured here are sent coastwise to London, Glasgow, Dundee, and other towns, there are few or no exports to foreign places from Montrose. Owing, however, to the bonded system having been extended to this port, nearly all the foreign wines and spirits consumed in the district, are brought coastwise to the bonded warehouses, and pay duty at the Custom-house when taken out for consumption.

The exports from this district by the coasting-trade consist of wheat, oats, barley, rye, peas, beans, and potatoes; salmon, codfish, and pork, the latter chiefly for the London market: great coal, culm, parret, lime, blue slate, iron, tallow, rosin, barilla, kelp, salt, and herrings from the Moray Frith, chiefly smoked and sent to the Hull and London markets. The principal import from the English coast is coal; but various other articles are imported and exported by regular traders to London, Glasgow, and Leith.

Montrose contains several public edifices, all designed with considerable taste and substantially executed. Among these are the church, with a fine gothic tower, St. John's church, St. Peter's episcopal chapel, the Town-hall, the Academy, the Lunatic Asylum, and the Jail. The finest object, however, and which combines ornament with utility, is the new Chain-bridge, erected, like many others in the United Kingdom, after a plan by Captain James Brown, of the Royal Navy. The foundation-stone of this admirable structure was laid on the 18th of September, 1828, and the whole was completed before the close of the following year. The distance between the towers at the two extremities of the bridge, measured from the centre, is four hundred and thirty-two feet. The height of each tower is seventy-one feet, namely, twenty-three and a half from the foundation to the roadway; forty-four from the roadway to the top of the cornice; and three feet and a half forming the cornice. It spans the river, South Esk, and is justly considered the finest specimen of the kind in Scotland. The whole cost is stated at twenty thousand pounds.

The population of Montrose continues rapidly to increase. The society is very superior to that of most country towns, and includes amongst its members men who have distinguished themselves in every department of the state. It was formerly represented in Parliament by Joseph Hume, Esq., a native of the place, and so well known as a leading member in the House of Commons.

DUNNOTTAR CASTLE

"High on a rock, half sea-girt, half on land,The castle stood, and still its ruins stand.Wide o'er the German main the prospect bent,Steep is the path and rugged the ascent:There hung the huge portcullis – there the barDrawn on the iron gate defied the war.""Dunnottar Castle," by Mrs. Carnegie, 1796.

The view of Dunnottar Castle, which so happily illustrates this portion of the work, represents one of the most remarkable features that are anywhere to be met with on the coasts of the British empire. The drawing was taken on the spot, and shows with admirable effect and precision those striking combinations of nature and art which, during a long series of ages, rendered the fortress of Dunnottar impregnable. But those rocky foundations from which it once rose in all the strength and grandeur of feudal architecture are fast yielding to the encroachments of the sea; its crested summits, once brilliant with arms and bristling with cannon, seem ready to drop from their precipice. Unroofed, unlatticed, untenanted, with not an ember left on its once capacious hearth, desolation and ruin are vividly pictured in its dreary solitude. The floors are covered with crumbling fragments of varied and costly decorations in sculpture, painting, and fretwork. Once a palace – commanding all that could minister to the security and luxury of its almost royal possessors, its battlements gay with standards, crowded with retainers, mailed guests in the hall, and minstrels in the court – it is now dark as a sepulchre; – banners, retainers, guests, minstrels, and the master of the feast himself – all are gone! The hoarse dash of the waves, the shrill scream of the stormy petrel, the crash of some disjointed and falling rock, or the whistling of the coming tempest, are almost the only sounds that now alternate among these embattled heights, where the curious stranger retraces with melancholy interest the days and deeds of antiquity. To him who is familiar with its history, Dunnottar speaks with an audible voice; every cave has a record – every turret a tongue; his ear is struck with "wandering voices," and words that never die seem at every step to arrest his attention.

The Castle of Dunnottar – now the stately and magnificent ruin thus feebly sketched – stands on an isolated rock two hundred feet perpendicular, washed on three sides by the sea, and on the other separated from the adjacent land by a wide and deep chasm, from which by a gate in the wall, nearly forty feet high, there is an entrance to the fortress. Leading upwards from this gate there is a long steep passage, partly arched over, and formerly secured by two drawbridges, the grooves for which are still visible. At the inner end of this passage is another gate, opening into the castle area, which is enclosed by a wall, and occupied by buildings of various epochs. But of all the buildings on this rock the chapel is the most ancient, and there is reason to believe that it originally served as the parish church of Dunnottar. The Castle, or the peninsular rock on which it stands, makes its first appearance in Scottish history during the wars of Bruce and Baliol, when, it is alleged by some modern authorities, the castle was erected by Sir William Keith as a place of safety for himself and friends. According to Blind Harry and Hector Boece, Dunnottar was surprised and taken by Sir William Wallace in 1297, and the Blind Historian relates that Dunnottar was occupied by four thousand English troops, who had fled before the victorious arms of the Liberator; and that when Wallace made the onslaught, as many of them as the church would contain took shelter there, in the hope that consecrated ground would not be violated by their slaughter; but, says the bard, —

"Wallace on fyre gart set all haistely,Brynt up the kyrk and all that was thairin."

In the year 1336 Dunnottar was fortified and garrisoned by Edward III.; but immediately after his departure for England it was attacked and carried by the gallant Sir Andrew Moray, who destroyed the fortifications of the Castle, so that it might not again afford ready protection to an enemy.

STONEHAVEN

"The flocks are white upon the moor,The forest's filled with deer;There's industry at every door,And shipping at the pier."

Stonehaven, like Aberdeen, has its old town and its new; but "with this distinction, that of the latter, the new town is the older of the two." The old town of Stonehaven, or Steenhive as it was formerly written, was built on feus granted by the "Earls Marischal," by one of whom it was erected into a burg of barony. The new town, or "Links of Arduthie," is separated from the old town by a brook, called the water of Carron, and is built upon the estate of the patriotic Mr. Barclay Allardyce, of Ury. It is the county-town; and hither, in 1660, the sheriff-court was removed from Kincardine by Act of Parliament.

On the south-west of a bare rocky promontory, called Garron-point, at the entrance of Stonehaven Bay, are seen the ruins of Cowie Chapel, which is said to have been dedicated to the Blessed Virgin. From this point on the north, called Garron, to that of Downie on the south, is what is termed the Bay of Stonehaven. The town stretches from the bridge over the Cowie river, on the north, to the above-mentioned headland, Downie Point, on the south; but it is divided, as already stated, into two parts by the "Carron;" the north part being the new, and the south the old, or sea-town; close to which last, and to Downie Point, which is a protection to it from south-east gales, stands the Harbour, erected, like most others on the east coast, sea-ward. It is a capacious basin, and would contain a great number of vessels, but until lately, when two cross-jetties were built, it was very insecure, or afforded little protection to vessels during north-east and east gales, to which it is much exposed, the entrance being to the east. It is now, however, comparatively secure; and gas-lights being erected, the one bearing on the other, vessels bound southward in winter find it a very agreeable retreat, and about thirty so situated have been seen in it at one time.

The exports consist of grain, timber, herrings, and other fish; the imports are principally coals and lime, of which a great quantity is required for agricultural purposes.

The Harbour, in spring-tides, will admit vessels drawing fourteen feet water, sometimes upwards; but in ordinary tides the depth can hardly be reckoned at more than from ten to eleven feet.

The trade of curing fish by smoke-drying, in imitation of the Finnan haddies, is carried on with much spirit: several large houses have been fitted up for this purpose and for red-herrings; and a stranger would scarcely believe the extent done in this business, the haddocks thus cured being sent to London, Edinburgh, and other markets in the south, by all conveyances.

The other trade of the place is principally in manufacturing woollen, linen, and cotton cloths, a branch of native industry in which great numbers of people are employed. The Glenury distillery is a large concern, and close to the town, from which a great quantity of whiskey is constantly shipped off.

Among the disasters which, in its day, Stonehaven has had to deplore, we may cite the following, as characteristic of those unhappy times when the country was torn by the violence of faction, and fire and sword laid waste this ill-fated district. On the 20th of March, 1645, the Marquis of Montrose, then quartered at Stonehaven, addressed a letter to Earl Marischal, at his castle of Dunnottar, about two miles from this, exhorting him to espouse the royal cause; but receiving no answer, he proceeded to wreak his vengeance on the earl's lands and dependants. "Thereafter," says the historian Spalding, "he fires the Tolbooth, a prison of Stonehaven, wherein there was store of grain, and the whole town, with all the barnyards, houses, and other buildings, except those of James Clark, wherein Montrose himself was quartered. They plundered a ship lying in the harbour, then set fire to her, as well as to all the fishing-boats then in the harbour. They burnt up the whole town of Cowie, houses, buildings, corn, and corn-yards; and in like manner plundered the whole goods, gear, horses, oxen, sheep, which they could get; plundered the parson of Dunnottar's house and set it on fire. The people of Stonehaven and Cowie, it is said, came out, men, women, and children at their feet and children in their arms, crying, howling, and weeping, praying the earl, for God's sake, to save them from this fire as soon as it was kindled; but these poor people got no answer, nor knew they where to go with their children. How lamentable to behold!"

ABERDEEN. GENERAL VIEW

The city of Aberdeen, the seat of two celebrated universities, is divided into the old and the new towns, at an interval of about a mile. Of these, the former – now reduced almost to a village – appears to have been a town of some note as early as the ninth century, but gradually fell into decay after the great epoch of the Reformation. The Cathedral of St. Machar was founded at the remote era of 1164, and repaired in the beginning of the fourteenth century. But a new building of more elegant design was founded by Bishop Kinnimond, the second prelate of that family, and finished by Bishop Leighton. The Reformation, however, suspended all further operations, and left the pile a monument of premature decay. Of King's College, founded at the close of the fifteenth century, the learned Hector Boethius was the first principal.

New Aberdeen, though irregularly built, is a handsome city, and beautifully situated on three gentle eminences at the mouth of the Dee. The streets are spacious, and many of the public buildings of elegant design. In ancient times, several religious establishments flourished here, belonging to the different orders of Dominicans, Carmelites, and Grey Friars, with an hospital, or maison-Dieu. Marischal College, so named from its liberal founder, George, Earl Marischal of Scotland, has, like its predecessor, been long celebrated as a seat of the muses. Its professors and lecturers – twenty-seven in number – have shone conspicuous in every department of human learning, and are continually sending forth in their pupils the living proofs of that zeal and assiduity with which their important functions are discharged. With the fame of this university, the names of Campbell and Beattie are more especially associated, as the champions of religion and the ornaments of our native literature.

The environs of this ancient city exhibit many pleasing indications of commercial improvements, which are daily acquiring fresh impulse, adding new embellishments to the landscape, and evincing an increase of comfort and independence among the inhabitants, who amount to about fifty thousand.

There are few springs of any consequence in Aberdeen or the neighbourhood, and although a supply of water can be had in most places, by digging to a depth of from ten to thirty feet, it is generally so hard as to be of comparatively little value. Close by the boundary of the parish, on the west side, are two springs, quite contiguous, which have been long known as the "Well of Spa." Both these springs, but especially the least copious one, are impregnated with carbonate of iron, and on that account have been long noticed as medicinal. Early in the seventeenth century an account of the properties and powers of these springs was published by Dr. Barclay, under the title of Callirhöe, commonly called the Well of Spa, or the Nymph of Aberdene. A building, which at that time protected the spring, having fallen into decay, was repaired by the celebrated painter George Jamieson, but was not long afterwards demolished by a flood of the Den-burn, which runs close beside it. In 1670, another building was erected over the spring, which still remains, consisting of a stone enclosure, with steps or benches, and an entablature bearing these inscriptions: —

"As Heaven gives me,So give I thee.""Hoc fonte derivata salus in Patriam populumque fluat,Spada Rediviva 1670."

Within the last two centuries both these springs have repeatedly disappeared and been recovered, and always retaining their chalybeate qualities till of late. Within the last few years, however, while digging upon the adjacent eminence for the foundations of the west wing of the new infirmary, it would seem as if the course of the water had been disturbed, or some other change produced, the consequence of which is, that now the larger spring appears to possess hardly any chalybeate impregnation, whilst the smaller one is much weaker than formerly.

ABERDEEN, FROM ABOVE THE CHAIN BRIDGE

"Blyth Aberdein! thou beriall of all tounis,The lamp of bewtie, bountie, and blythnes;Unto the heaven ascendit thy renown isOff vertew, wisdom, and of worthines;Benottit is thy name of nobilnes; —Be blyth and blissful, burgh of Aberdein!" – Dunbar.

The Port of Aberdeen is now universally known among seafaring men as one of the safest and most commodious in Scotland. The skill and practical efforts of both Smeaton and Telford were successively employed upon it; and after an arduous and extensive enterprise, the grand object has been fully obtained. To those who are only acquainted with the harbour under its present aspect it will be difficult to convey a correct notion of its appearance in ancient times. There is reason to suppose that at a period beyond the reach of history, the river Dee must have discharged its waters into the sea at the Craiglug – where the Chain Bridge is seen in the engraving – and that by their alluvial deposits, and the effects of the north-east winds, in accumulating the sands in the neighbourhood, the ground now occupied by the village of Footdee, the shorelands and Sandilands, the Links and the islands in the estuary were gradually raised above the level of the sea. At a less remote period it is believed that the river Don poured its floods into the frith of the Dee: and the conjecture derives strength from the notices of Roman geographers. The occurrence of great changes is attested by various remains which have been disinterred at different periods. Thirteen feet under low-water mark in spring-tides, and twenty-eight feet below the general surface of the Inches, were discovered two human skulls, a large piece of flint, and great quantities of shells and other marine deposits; and in excavating the canal, at a considerable distance from the shore, anchors and other articles of shipwreck were found deeply imbedded in the earth.

The entrance to the harbour of Aberdeen is naturally bad, owing to a bar at the mouth of the river, where, at ebb-tide, the depth of water was often not more than two feet. To remedy this evil was, from a very early period, the ardent desire of the citizens, and to some of their first efforts in this direction we have alluded in our notice of Aberdeen Light-house. But it is since the commencement of the seventeenth century that the most effective improvements have been made, amongst which we may name the erection of a bulwark on the south side of the entrance, and the removal of a great stone, called "Knock-Maitland," which lay nearly in the middle of the river, both of which were accomplished in succession; the first in 1608, and the latter in 1618. Between 1623 and 1658, the quay was extended eastward, towards Futtie; by which means a considerable portion of ground was redeemed below the Castle-hill, and is now covered with buildings. In 1755 an additional quay was built a good way further down, opposite the village of Torrie. In 1770, further improvements were projected; and, on a report from Mr. Smeaton, recommending the erection of a pier on the north side of the entrance, so that the influx of sand from the north might be prevented, and the removal of the bar effected, by confining the waters of the river Dee within narrower bounds, the work was commenced in 1775, and finished in less than six years. The length of this pier was twelve hundred feet, and it terminated in a round head of sixty feet in diameter. Owing, however, to a departure from Mr. Smeaton's plan, by which the pier was founded too far to the north, it was found that a heavy swell entered the harbour; and to obviate this formidable inconvenience, a bulwark was projected from the pier, to about one-third across the channel.

By these means considerable improvements were effected; but as the trade of the city increased, inconvenience was still felt from a deficiency of water on the bar; and Mr. Telford, having been consulted in 1810, on the means of remedying this evil, recommended that the pier should be extended, and that wet-docks should be formed in the harbour. These works were commenced forthwith, and the pier, carried on to the extent of nine hundred feet beyond the head of Smeaton's pier, and again finished with a round head, was completed in 1816. In the course of the following winter, however, this head was destroyed by the storms; but being rebuilt with a slope towards the sea, it has since stood without very material damage. A breakwater, extending to the length of eight hundred feet, was also built on the south side, by which the mouth of the channel was narrowed, and the entrance protected from the storms of the south-east. Wharfs were built along the south-west side of Futtie; the pier opposite Torrie was enlarged; and, latterly, the quay has been extended westward from the old quay-head; and by raising embankments on the Inches, a considerable range of quay-room has been gained there, which is connected with the town by a swivel-bridge, opposite Marischal-street. By all these combined measures, quay-room has been provided to the extent of about four thousand feet; a tide-harbour has been formed, in which, at spring-tides, the depth of water is about eleven feet at the west-end, gradually increasing to fifteen feet, where it joins the course of the river; while the depth of the water on the bar has been increased to about nineteen feet.

ABERDEEN LIGHTHOUSE

Immediately to the south of the small bay of Greyhope stands the Girdleness Lighthouse; an erection by which the trade of Aberdeen has been greatly benefitted. The Girdleness, from which it takes its name, is a conspicuous promontory of which the Commissioners of the Northern Lights took advantage to erect this monitory beacon: it was lighted up for the first time on the night of the 15th of October, 1833, and is a lofty, circular tower, built of granite, and crowned with two copper domes, one within the other, in order to prevent the effects which would follow from the condensation of vapour from the heated air of the lamps. The dwelling-houses of the keepers are at the bottom of the tower; and a field of considerable extent has been walled in and cultivated for their accommodation. It is on the larboard, or left-hand side, as we enter the port, and is known to mariners as a double-light, a distinction produced by placing two lights in the same tower, the one above the other. Of these, the lower light is visible in clear weather at the distance of thirteen, and the higher at that of sixteen miles. They are under the charge of two keepers, one of whom mounts guard at sunset, and in case of emergency can summon assistance by means of an alarm-bell, placed in the sleeping apartments, which may be rung from the light-room, by means of an air-blast, through tubes laid for that purpose. This edifice, of incalculable benefit to the cause of humanity, was erected after the design of Robert Stevenson, Esq., and does great honour to his talents. The bay of Greyhope, above-named, is memorable as the scene of many a disastrous shipwreck, particularly that of the Oscar, in which, out of a crew of forty men, only two were saved. This occurred on the 1st of April 1813.