Page:Catholic Encyclopedia, volume 5.djvu/330

 EDICT

284

EDINBURGH

fold, and, wlien the axe of the guillotine was about to fall, consoled his beloved master with the noble words: ''Son of St. Louis, ascend to heaven." In his graphic and authoritative account of the last mo- ments of Louis XVI (the original of which in French is preserved in the British Museum) the abbe is silent about this fine apostrophe, which everyone has heard of; but, when asked if he made use of the memorable expression, he replied that, having no recollection of anj-thing that happened to himself at that awful mo- ment, he neither affirmed nor denied having used the words. He was allowed to leave the scene of the exe- cution unmolested, and so escaped ; but soon after his head was demanded in several clubs, so that he was obliged to quit Paris and take refuge at Bayeux, whence at that time he might easily have escaped to England. Three chief considerations, however, bound him to the land of horrors. He had a great diocese committed to his care; he had promised Madame Elisabeth, then in prison, never to desert her, and he could not abandon his mother and sister, still living in Paris. Dressed as an ordinary citizen, and passing under the name now of Essex, now of Edgeworth, and again of Henrj', he eluded capture and the guillotine, until finally in August, 1796, after the death of his mother, and the execution of Madame Elisabeth, he escaped to Portsmouth, and proceeded to London.

Mr. Pitt offered to settle a pension for life on him, but he respectfully declined it. During the three months he spent in London he was lionized by fash- ionable society. His brother, Ussher, who resided at Firmount, and his relatives at Edgeworthstown, proud of his fame and renown, were most anxious to see him in Ireland; and, in fact, he was on the point of revisiting the land of his birth when he was entrust- ed with confidential despatches for Louis XVIII, then at Blankenburg. This changed all his plans. .\t the earnest entreaty of the exiled king he resolved to remain with him as his chaplain, going afterwards with the royal family to Mittau in Russia, where he spent the remainder of his days, revered and honoured by all with whom he came in contact. The Emperor Paul settled a pension of 500 roubles per annum on him. When Napoleon invaded Russia in 1807 it hap- pened that some French soldiers were taken prisoners, and sent to Mittau. A contagious fever broke out among them, and in attending to their spiritual wants Abb6 Edgeworth, never of a robust constitution, fella victim to the plague. The daughter of Louis XVI, despite the manifest danger of contagion, attended night and day at the sick bed of her " beloved and revered invalid, her more than friend, who had left kindred and country for her family", to use her own words. He was interred at Mittau. Louis XVIII wrote his epitaph, a copy of which, together with a letter of condolence, was sent by Louis' orders to Mr. Ussher Edgeworth, the abba's brother, residing in Ireland.

C. S. Edgeworth, Memoirs of the Ahhe Edqeworth: con- taining his Narrative of the hast Hours of Louis A V'l (London, 1S15); Thiers. Histoirc de la Revolution francaise (1827); II. L. Edgeworth, Memoirs (London, 1820); Webb, Com- pendium of Irish Biography (Dublin. 1878); Gordon. Five Unpublished Letters of I'Abbc Edgeworth de Firmont in The Tablet (London, 28 April, 1900).

Joseph Guinan. Edict of Milan. See Const.\ntine the Great. Edict of Nantes. See Huguenots. Edict of Worms. See Luther.

Edinburgh, the capital of Scotland, though not its largest city, derives its name from the time (about A.I). 020) when the fortress of Edwin's burgh was r.iised on a lofty spur of the Pentland Hills, overlook- ing the Firth of Forth, and established the .Anglian dnniitiion in the northern part of the Northumbrian Kingdom. Edinburgh Castle was a royal residence ia.

the reign of Malcolm Canmore, husband of St. Mar- garet, who died there in 109.5. Roimd the castle the town grew up, and a little lower down the collegiate church of St. Giles, predecessor of the present church bearing that name, was erected in the twelfth century. St. Margaret's son. King David I, founded the Abbey of Holyrood, at the foot of the castle hill, 1128; but the town of Edinburgh for several centuries did not ex- tend be.vond the ridge sloping eastwards from the castle. In the middle of the fifteenth century Edin- burgh became the real capital of Scotland, that is. the seat of the Parliament and the Government, as well as the residence of her kings, and the scene of many of the most important provincial councils which regulated the affairs of the Scottish Church. James II was the first king crov\^led at Edinburgh instead of in the Abbey of Scone, and he and his successors conferred many privileges on the capital, and did all in their power to develop it and increase its prosperity. The buildings of the city gradually spread outside the ancient walls, all along the sloping ridge which extends from the castle at the top to Holyrood at the bot- tom ; and towards the end of the nineteenth century the New Town was built to the northward, beyond the extensive lake (since drained) which stretched under the castle hill.

During the past hundred years Edinburgh has steadily increased in population and wealth, if not so rapidly as other cities which are greater centres of manufactures and commerce. The unrivalled beauty of its situation, and the social and other advantages which it offers as the capital of the countrj-. as well as the remarkable educative facilities afforded by its many splendidly equipped schools and colleges, have always made it exceptionally attractive as a place of residence. Literary taste and culture were long the special characteristic of Edinburgh society, and it still possesses some of the literary charm which won for the city the title of the Modern Athens in the second quar- ter of the nineteenth centurj', when Scott, Wilson, Jeffrey, Brougham, and others made it famous by their personality and their genius. Modern facilities of travel and of intercommimication have inevitably given to Edinburgh, as to every centre of population in the kingdom outside London, a certain note of pro- vincialism ; but it has not altogether lost the dignity and charm properto a capital. The population of Edinburgh is now (1908) 317,000, an increase of more than 100,000 in the past thirty years; and its total area is nearly 1 1 ,000 acres. It returns four members to Parliament, and is governed by a town coimcil of fifty members, presided over by the lord provost. Printing, brewing, and distilling have long been, and still are, the prin- cipal industries of the city. Edinburgh is the seat of the supreme court of Scottish law, which in its exter- nal forms as well as in many essential points differs greatly from the law of England. The presidents of the courts are the lord-justice-general and the lord- justice-clerk; and the judges, properly entitled "sen- ators of the college of justice", enjoy the official title of lord. The supreme courts occupy the ancient Scottish Parliament house, a stately seventeenth- century building; and under the same roof is the Advocates' Library, one of the most extensive and valuable collections of books and manuscripts in the kingdom.

Edinburgh University, the only one of the four Scottish universities not founded in Catholic times, was established in 1.582 l)y royal charter granted by James VI, and was speedily enriched by many bene- factions from prominent citizens. Its buildings occupy the site of the ancient collegiate chiu-ch of St. Mary-iii-the-Fields, or the Kirk o' Field (well known as the scene of the mysterioiis -.nurder of Lord Darnley), and have in recent years been greatly extended and embellished. The university comprises the \isual fac- ulties of divinity, law, medicine, and arts, and has pro-