enclosures, but without effect, for nobody would believe him. At last he fell upon a most ingenious expedient, which completely put an end to the system of robbery which was nightly practised. Procuring an old human leg from the Royal Infirmary, he had it dressed up in a stocking, shoe, and buckle, and sent it through the town by the town-crier, who exhibited it aloft to public view, proclaiming that it had been found last night in Mr Walter Ross's policy at Stockbridge, and offering to restore it to the disconsolate owner. After this no one attempted to break into his grounds.

Mr Ross built a very curious tower, known amongst the old inhabitants by the name of "Ross's Folly." It stood on an eminence at the north end of the ground now occupied by the east side of Ann Street; its exact position would be in the back-green of the house No. 10. Its height was about 40 feet by about 18 or 20 feet. It was nearly square in form, and had the appearance of a Border peel. It consisted of two apartments, one above and one below. The entrance to the upper storey was attained by passing through a Gothic-shaped doorway to a hanging stair that swept round three sides of the building. The upper part was handsomely finished and decorated. On the roof, surrounded by some ornamentation, was a wellexecuted painting of some incident in heathen mythology. In the walls were niches, which had at one time been filled with figures. It was lighted by a window to the north, another to the south, and a double window to the east. It had evidently been used as a sort of summer house. The lower part of the building had nothing but the bare walls. The entrance was by a large doorway or gate opening from the east. It was here that Mr Ross was buried. About 1818 his remains were removed and re-interred in St Cuthbert's Churchyard. For some time

before the demolition of the tower it was used as a stable. Into the tower and around it were built a number of curious carved stones that Mr Ross had collected from Edinburgh and elsewhere, the most interesting of which were the four sculptured heads that formerly adorned the Old Cross of Edinburgh. How Mr Ross obtained these heads is well known. He had bargained with the magistrates for the old stones when the cross removed. He sent carts early in the morning and took away the heads, which were not included in the bargain. They were claimed by the authorities, but they were never returned. These heads were taken out of the tower in 1824, and sent to Abbotsford as a present to Sir Walter Scott (the writer of this was present when these heads were removed). There was also built into the walls the font of the Chapel of St Ninian, which formerly stood in the neighbourhood of Leith Street. A curious carved stone in alto-relievo of an eagle holding lightning in its talons, which was dug up at Cramond, and supposed to be of Roman execution, is mentioned in Wood's Ancient and Modern State of the Parish of Cramond, as having been built into the curious tower erected by Mr Walter Ross at St Bernard's, Edinburgh, but we do not remember ever having seen it. There was a small detached building on the west side of the tower, but it had been greatly broken down. In the remaining part of its masonry there were fragments of a large empty niche. Three sides of the tower were covered with ivy, which afforded comfortable refuge for countless numbers of sparrows. The upper part of the building was latterly occupied as a dwelling-house by William Hutchison, an honest, steady, Morayshire man, who cleaned the part of Ann Street then built, and also acted as its night watchman. We knew the tower and its tenant well. Often in

boyish days have we climbed its stair and explored all its nooks and crannies, its outs and its ins. Our courage was sometimes put to a severe test when we went to help William Craik to supper his father's horses, which were stabled in the under part of the tower. This business to us was no joke on a dark wintry night, the tower standing solitary and alone, the wind rustling among the ivy, or whistling mournfully through its open doorway, or shrieking among its outworks, rendered the whole scene eerie and weird-like. With stable lantern in hand, we two thorough cowards mounted the steep brae to the tower, and opened the big door. We kept our eyes as firmly closed as possible. Whistling loudly and bravely, "to keep our courage up," the work was got through more by groping than by seeing. If a rat had given a squeak we believe we would have fainted. The cause of our terror was the dread of encountering Mr Ross's ghost. He had been buried, by his own special order, in what was now the stable, and although his remains had been removed, we knew well the belief entertained by some of the old inhabitants in the locality, that Mr Ross's sudden and peculiar death was a judgment from heaven on account of the infidel opinions he was known to have held; for Mr Ross belonged to a school which at that time rendered infidelity fashionable alike by its practice and its writings.

The feuing of St Bernard's required the removal of this curious building, which, when viewed from the low ground, had a peculiarly striking and picturesque effect. Ross's Folly was demolished in 1825. With the exception of the four heads already mentioned,1 few or none of the

1 These curious heads were very carefully taken out of the walls of the tower. A quantity of soft stable dung was placed beneath where the stone was in the wall which when loosened fell on this soft bed, sustaining no injury.

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