Page:A biographical dictionary of eminent Scotsmen, vol 2.djvu/243

Rh Williame bischope of abirdene and utheris, be usit generaly within al our Realme alssone as the sammyn may be imprented and providit, and that no nianer of sic bukis of Salisbury use be brocht to be sauld within our Realme in tym cuming; and gif ony dois in the contrar, that thai sal tyne the sammyne; Quharfor we charge straitlie and commandis yow al and sindrj our officiaris, liegis, and subdittis, that nane of yow tak apon hand to do ony thing incontrar this our awnpromitt, devise and ordinance, in tyme cuming, under the pane of escheting of the bukis, and punishing of thair persons bringaris tharof within our Realme, in contrar this our statut, with al vigour as efferis. Geven under our prive Sel at Edinburgh, the xv day of September, and of our Regne the xx" yer.

(Registrum Sec. Sig. iii. 129.)

This typographical business would appear to have been in full operation before the end of 1507, as, on the 22d of December that year, we find the royal treasurer paying fifty shillings for "3 prentitbukes to the king, tane fra Andro Millaris wyftl" The Cowgate, a mean street, now inhabited by the least instructed class of the citizens of Edinburgh, was the place where that grand engine of knowledge was established ; as appears from the imprints of some of Chepman and Millar's publications, and also from a passage in the Traditions of Edinburgh, where the exact site of the house is thus made out:—"In the lower part of the church-yard [of St Giles, adjoining the Cowgate] there was a small place of worship, denominated the Chapel of Holyrood. Walter Chepman, the first printer in Edinburgh, in 1528, endowed an altar in this chapel with his tenement in the Cowgate; and, by the tenor of this charter, we are enabled to point out very nearly the residence of this remarkable person. The tenement is thus described:—'All and haill this tenement of land, back and foir, with houses, biggings, yards, and well, thereof, lying in the Cowgate of Edinburgh, on the south side thereof, near the said chapel, betwixt the lands of James Lamb on the east, and the lands of John Aber on the west, the arable lands, called Wairam's croft, on the south, and the said street on the north part.' "It is probable that the site is now covered by the new bridge thrown across the Cowgate at that point.

In the course of a few years, Chepman and Millar produced works, of which hardly any other set is known to exist than that preserved in the Advocates' Library.

The privilege granted to Chepman and Millar Mas of a rigidly exclusive kind—for at this early period the system of monopolizing knowledge, which is now an absurdity and a disgrace, was a matter of necessity. In January 1509, we find Walter Chepman asserting the right of his patent against various individuals who had infringed upon it by importing books into the country. The lords of council thus re-inforced the privilege they had formerly granted to him:—

the complaint maid by Walter Chepman, that quhar he, at the desyre of our soverane lord, furnist and brocht hame ane prent and prentaris, for prenting of croniclis, missalis, portuuss, and utheris buikis within this realme,