V
dependent, a methodift, an anabaptift, a barony church, and one
in the fuburbs of the Gorbels.
But the mod beautiful is that o f St. Andrew’s, or the JV®
Church, whofe front graced with an elegant portico; does th e citf
great credit, if it had not been disfigured by a flender fqu®
tower, with a pepper-box top; and in general the fte e p le s j
Glafgow are in a remarkably bad tañe, being in fail no favorite
part o f architefture with the church of Scotland. The infideof
that juft mentioned is finifhed not only with neatnefs but w ith elegance
j is fupported by pillars, and very prettily ftuccoed. Iti
one of the very few exceptions to the flovenly and indecent ma.
ner in which the houfes of G o d , in Scotland, are k ep t: reform,
tion, in matters o f religion, feldom obferves mediocrity; here i
was at firft outrageous, for a place commonly neat was deemd
to favor of popery : but to avoid the imputation o f that extreme,
they ran into another; for in many parts, o f North-Britain on
L o r d feems ftill to be worihipped in a ¿able, and often-in aveij
wretched one: many of the churches are thatched with heath, aid
in fome places are in fuch bad repair as to be half open at to p ; ft
that the people appear to worihip as the Druids did of old, in open
temples. It is but common juftke to fay, that this is. no fa u lt oí
the clergy, or o f the people, but entirely o f the landed intereft;
who having, at the reformation, íháred in the plunder of tk
church, were burthened with the building and r e p a i r in g of tk.
houfes of worihip. It is too frequently the cafe; that the gentle-
men cannot be induced to undertake the moft common repairs,
without being threatened with a procefs before the lords, o f fefliott
I
or perhaps having the procefs adlually made, which is attended
with odium, trouble and expence to the poor incumbents.
I Near the cathedral is the ruin of the caftle, or the bilhop’s
■dace, the great tower was built by John Cameron, prelate in
1426. Buchanan * relates an abfurd tale, that this bilhop was
fummoned to the great tribunal by a loud preternatural voice;
that he afiembled his fervants, when to their great terror the call
was repeated ; and the bilhop died in great agonies. His offence
isf concealed from us, for he appears to have been a good and
an able man.
■ Archbilhop Bethune furrounded the palace with a fine wall,
and made a baftion over one corner, and a tower over another.
This caftle was befieged in 1544, by the regent Arran, in the
civil difputes at that time; who took it, and hanged eighteen o f
the garrifon, placed there by Lenox, a favorer o f the reformation.
■ In Glafgow were two religious houfes and an hofpital. One
pf Dominicans, founded by the bilhop and chapter in 1270, and
another of Obfervantines in 1476, by John Laing, bilhop o f Glaf-
fow, and Thomas Forjyth, reftor of the college.
■ The univerfity was founded in 1450, by James II. Pope Nicholas
V. gave the Bull, but bilhop Turnbull fupplied the money.
It confifts of one college, a large building with a handfome front
to the ftreet, refembling fbme o f the old colleges in Oxford.
Wsarles I. fubfcribed 200 1. towards this work, but was prevented
■tom paying it by the enfuing troubles ; but Cromwel afterwards
■ilfilled the defign o f the royal donor. Here are about four hun-
C a s t l e ,
R e l ig io u s
HOUSES,
UniVERSITri
* Lib. xi, C. 25.
X 2 dred