Descriptive Gazetteer Entry for Aberdeen

Aberdeen, the ' Granite City,' capital of Aberdeenshire, seat of a university, and chief town and seaport in the North of Scotland, lies in lat. 57° 9° N, and long. 2° 6' W, on the left bank of the Dee, at its entrance into the German Ocean. It is both a royal and a parliamentary burgh, the latter comprising all the district between the rivers Dee and Don for 3 miles inland- viz., the whole of St Nicholas or City parish (794 acres), part of Old Machar parish (5115 acres),and part of Banchory-Devenick parish (33 acres), and thus having a total area of 5942 acres: whilst the royal burgh, occupying the SE angle of the parliamentary, includes, like it, the whole of St Nicholas, but only 376 acres of Old Machar, and measuring 1½ mile from N to S by 2¼ miles from E to W: has a total area of 1170 acres. Aberdeen is 98 miles NNE of Edinburgh as the crow flies, 111 by road, and 115¼ by rail (via Tay Bridge: 135¼ via Perth and Stirling). By the North British or the Caledonian it further is 42 miles N by E of Montrose, 73¾ NNE of Dundee, 89¾ NE by N of Perth, 152¾ NE of Glasgow, 513 NNW of London: by the Great North of Scotland it is 43½ miles E by N of Ballater, 29¼ ESE of Alford, 44¼ S by W of Peterhead, 47½ S of Fraserburgh, 53¼ SE of Keith, 80¾ SE of Elgin, 108½ ESE of Inverness, and 202½ SE of Thurso. By sea it has regular steam communication southwards with Dundee, Edinburgh, Newcastle, Stockton, Hull, and London, northwards with Wick, Thurso, Orkney, Shetland, the Hebrides, and Liverpool.

The city proper stands on four eminences-Castle Hill (80 feet), School Hill (65), Woolman Hill (58), and Port Hill (100), and the highest points within the parliamentary burgh are Cairncry (446 feet), Woodhill (340), and Stocket Hill (320). Naturally bleak and tame, its environs have little of the picturesqueness that distinguishes those of Inverness, Perth, Stirling, and Edinburgh: but they contain a few good features which have been highly improved by art. The approach by sea lies along a bleak, sandy coast, with low rocks and long reefs in the foreground, and a tame unfeatured surface in the rear, and becomes interesting only at the point of sudden ingress among the crowded shipping of the harbour. The land approach from the south is singularly repulsive, traversing a broad, low, moorish outskirt of the Grampians, till it bursts at once on a near view of the Dee and the city. The contrast, by either of these approaches, between the near and distant scenes, is very striking, and never fails to make a strong impression upon strangers. Both the city and its surroundings, as first beheld, are very beautiful. Nor do the main thoroughfares, when entered, disappoint the first impression, but rather confirm and deepen it. Union Street especially, with its continuation Castle Street, appears enchanting: and every travelled visitor will readily say with the author of The Land We Live In, that ' it possesses all the stability, cleanliness, and architectural-beauties of the London west end streets, with the gaiety and brilliancy of the Parisian atmosphere.' Walks, in various directions, through the city, disclose great diversity of structure and character, and three walks of 4 or 5 miles each among the environs are highly interesting. The first of the three goes to Old Aberdeen, up the Don past Grandholm, and through Woodside, and returns to the city by the Inverness road: the second leads by the Lunatic Asylum to Stocket Hill, where the best general view of the city and the surrounding country is obtained, proceeds thence to the great granite quarries of Rubislaw, and returns by the Skene turnpike road: and the third goes south-westward to the Old Bridge of Dee, passes down the right bank of the river to Girdleness Lighthouse, and crosses by the ferry to Footdee.

The city's alignment, structure, and extent are greatly different now from what they were of old. It now has noble streets in all directions, specially a main one from E to W, two others from S to N, and numerous fine parallel or intersecting ones, together with spacious and imposing outlets: but, till near the end of last century, Aberdeen was all an assemblage of narrow, illbuilt, badly arranged thoroughfares, without any good openings into the country. It probably began with a few rude huts, near the spot where Trinity Church now stands: it next seems to have occupied the neighbourhood of the Castle and the Green, and gradually extended in the direction of Shiprow, Exchequer Row, and the S side of Castlegate. But in 1336 it was almost totally destroyed by an English army under Edward III.: and it then rose from its ruins, like a phœnix from the flames, and spread over the eminences of Castle Hill, Port Hill, St Catherine's Hill, and Woolman Hill. Then it was that the city took the name of New Aberdeen, as it is still sometimes called: but it took it, not in contradistinction to the kirk town of Old Machar, now called Old Aberdeen, but to its own old town destroyed by the English. Yet even the new town, with the exception of its public buildings, was rude, irregularly arranged, and unsubstantial. Stone houses, so late as 1545, were possessed exclusively by grandees: and even down to 1741 wooden houses formed the W side of Broadgate. A large fenny marsh, the Loch, occupied, till the latter part of last century, much of the site to the W of Gallowgate, and the very best streets, till then, were narrow, uneven, and paved with cobble. stones: the parts most favourable to drainage and ventilation were crowded with buildings, and abominably filthy: and the thoroughfares leading to the Dee and to the North, were steep, rough, narrow, and malodorous. But about the end of last century, a great change began, that rapidly gave the city grand new features, and at the same time set its finest old ones in advantageous lights. First, a street was opened from Broad Street to North Street, so as to form an improved outlet to the North. Next, Marischal Street was opened from Castle Street to the Quay: and, though rather inconveniently steep, it is interesting, both as still a great thoroughfare from the heart of the city to the harbour, and as the first Aberdeen street that was paved with dressed stones. Next, a new and important exit to the NW was formed by opening George Street through the middle of the Loch, to communicate with a new turnpike road to Inverury. Next, two grand new exits were made, from the middle of the town at Castle Street by respectively Union Street to the W, and King Street to the N, and these were estimated by the engineer to cost the Town Council about £42,000, but soon actually cost them £171,280, and then involved them in bankruptcy. And both contemporaneously with these improvements and subsequently to them, onward till 1881, other great improvements, of various kinds and aggregately very costly, have been made, and will be mentioned in our notices of public buildings, public works, and the harbour. Yet the very improvements, or at least the openings for the new streets, and the clearing for some public buildings together with the forming of railways, have produced the evils of placing grandeur and meanness side by side, and of greatly augmenting the density of the poorer population. No fewer than some 60 narrow lanes and about 168 courts or closes, of an average breadth of at most 7 feet, still exist: are mostly situated in the immediate or near vicinity of fine new streets: and occasion the average distribution of the inhabitants of St Nicholas to stand at so high a ratio as 16.8 to each house, and of the royal burgh as 14.8. Some closes, such as Smith's and Peacock's, adjacent to the east end of Union Street, exhibit the lower grades of civilisation only a few steps apart from the higher: and other places, such as the courts branching from Gallowgate, are about the dingiest and most unwholesome to be found anywhere in a British town. Nevertheless, the death-rate per 1000 diminished from 22.5 during 1867-72, to 21.7 during 1873-78, being thus below the average of the other large Scotch towns: and in 1879 it further sank to 20.9, whilst in zymotic diseases the deaths averaged 31 per 10,000, the lowest figures since the Registration Act came into force. The mean temperature is 45o 8', the average yearly rainfall 31.65 inches.

The city extends about 2 miles southward, from Kittybrewster to Ferryhill, and about 2¼ miles westward from Footdee to Skene Road: and measures about 7½ miles in circumference: but it is thoroughly compact over only about 1 by 1½ mile. The modern streets run so nearly in parallels or at right angles to one another, as to show readily the incongruities at their junctions with the old thoroughfares, and some of them have been constructed in a way of incongruity with themselves, a poor street being placed between two rich ones, as Gordon Street between Dee and Bon Accord Streets. The general appearance, however, is redeemed, partly by the character of the building material, partly by the large aggregate of gardens, and chiefly by the spaciousness and elegance of the main streets. The edifices, both public and private, are for the most part constructed of a very fine granite from the neighbouring quarries: and those of the principal modern streets are so clean, so massive, so uniformly surfaced, and reflect the light so clearly from the glittering mica of the granite, as to look, on a sunny day, as if they had just been hewn and polished from the rocks upon which they stand. Gardens are attached to many of the houses even in the compacter parts of the city, and to almost all in the suburbs, so that, even in the absence of any such spacious gardens as intersect the New Town of Edinburgh, they produce an effect of airiness and well-being. The view along Union Street, westward, is one of the finest in any city in the world, suggesting to the imagination the tombs of Thebes, the Cyclopean walls, or the marble temples of ancient Greece, and at the same time having beauties of its own. This street is 1077 yards long, or, with its eastward and westward continuations - Castle Street and Union Place - 1516 yards, with a breadth of 70 feet. Spacious, straight, and lined on both sides with elegant buildings, public and private, it runs on a higher level than the portions of the town on its southern flank, so as to command a pleasant prospect over them to the S side of the Dee. By Union Bridge it is carried over two of the old streets, as well as over the ravine of the Den Burn, which formerly caused vast inconvenience to traffic. A main line of streets, 1597 yards long, and called successively St Nicholas Street, George Street, and North Broadford, strikes northward to the country from Union Street, at a point 320 yards E of the bridge, and, for the most part, is finely edificed. Market Street strikes southward, at a point nearly opposite St Nicholas Street: is 200 yards long, spacious, and moderately steep: leads direct to the station and the harbour: and, since 1864, has been considerably re-edificed with houses of a superior character. Broad Street (425 yards) runs nearly parallel to St Nicholas Street, striking off at the mergence of Union Street into Castle Street: is adorned by Marischal College: and passes, at its N end, into line with Gallowgate (600 yards). Castle Street expands from the E end of Union Street, forms a quadrangle about 203 yards long and 43 wide, takes its name from an ancient fortress which stood on a rising ground at its E end, is rich in public ornamental structures, and forms one of the most striking market-places and centres of business in the world. Ki1g Street goes northward from the eastern part of Castle Street: is 1186 yards long, and spacious: contains several handsome public buildings: and presents, on the whole, an aspect little inferior to that of Union Street. Rubislaw Terrace, one of several new streets in the extreme W, is much superior to anything of its class in the aristocratic quarter of almost any town in Scotland: and the other modern streets, whilst challenging no special notice, may be described in the aggregate as equal at least to the second and third class streets of most stone-built towns in Britain. Few houses, or parts of houses, remain to show the Aberdeen style of domestic architecture in former centuries: yet enough are standing to interest both the architect and the antiquary. The vestige of a tower, said to have belonged to the Knights Templars, stands in Bothwell Court, adjacent to Justice Street. A house with projecting circular staircase and antique lintel, said to have been the parsonage of St Nicholas, stands in School Hill. A building, called Wallace Tower, having in a niche a rude and very ancient effigy of Wallace, and said to have been occupied as an hostelry, stands in Nether Kirkgate: and another old tenement, known as Mar's Castle, with a diminutive crow-stepped and corbelled gable, circular staircase, and small square openings for windows, stands in Gallowgate, and bears date 1494. The four have strong generic likeness to one another, and challenge more attention from antiquaries than many old buildings elsewhere of higher note. Every remaining specimen of the domestic architecture of the later part of last century is entirely commonplace, but No. 64 Broad Street possesses interest as the place where Lord Byron passed his earliest boyhood (1790-98) under his mother's care: Thackeray visited it when lecturing in Aberdeen on The Four Georges.

The plain old town-house was built in 1730, and the court-house adjoining in 1818: but in 1865 it was resolved to occupy their site with a new suite of county and municipal buildings, which, commenced in 1867 at an estimated cost of £69,000, were completed at a cost of £80,000 and upwards. Designed by Messrs Peddie & Kinnear, of Edinburgh, in the Scottish Baronial style of the 16th century, with French and Belgian features, they form a four-storied, Kemnay granite pile 64 feet high, presenting one frontage to Castle Street of 225, and one to Broad Street of 109 feet: along both façades runs a basement arcade of columns at 12 feet intervals, supporting elliptical arches, and surmounted by a second and smaller arcaded range. At the streets' junction stands the magnificent clock-tower, 28 feet square and 72 feet high, with corner pepper-box turrets 36 feet more: and, over all, a lantern gablet, culminating in a vane at the height of 190 feet. In June 1880 it was decided to hang a fine peal of bells in this tower, which almost dwarfs an older one to the E-sole relic of the former town-house-although its lead-covered spire has a height of 120 feet. Within are the vestibule and the grand staircase (35 feet square): the Great Hall (74 by 35 feet, and 50 high), with five lofty traceried windows, oak panelling, and open timber roof: the richly-decorated town-hall, in the clock-tower (41 by 25½ feet, and 15 high), with three old crystal lustres: the courthouse behind (50&ht. by 37 feet, and 36½ high), etc.: special adornments are Provost Davidson's armour, Steell's marble statue of the late Provost Blaikie, a marble bust of John Phillip, and portraits by him of the Queen and Prince Consort, of Queen Anne by Kneller, of Provost Hadden, the late Earl of Aberdeen, and others.-The new Post Office, at the foot of Market Street, was erected (1873-76) at a cost of £16,000, and is a simple but effective edifice of Kemnay granite, 100 feet square and 40 high, in the Renaissance style.-The Market Hall, Market Street, was built by a joint-stock company (1840-42), at a cost of £28,000. It is divided into a basement story and a galleried main floor, which, 315 feet long, 106 broad, and 45 high, has a Gothic roof of open timberwork, and itself is divided by two ranges of massive pillars into three alleys, like the nave and aisles of a church. It contains all manner of stalls and shops, and in its centre has a beautiful fountain of polished Peterhead granite, with basin 7½ feet in diameter, hewn from a single block.-The neighbouring Corn Exchange, in Hadden Street, measuring 70 by 40 feet, and 30 high, with open roof, was built for £1000 in 1854, and except on Fridays serves as a public newsroom.-Close to the SE corner of Union Bridge is the Trades Hall, a fine Elizabethan granite structure, erected in 1847 at a cost exceeding £7000, and containing an antique set of carved oak chairs (1574), portraits by Jameson, and the shields of the seven incorporated trades-hammer men (1519), bakers (1398), wrights and coopers (1527), tailors (1511), shoemakers (1484 and 1520), weavers (1449), and fleshers (1534)- whose curious inscriptions form the subject of a monograph (1863) by Mr Lewis Smith.-The Society of Advocates, chartered in 1774, 1799, and 1862, and numbering 124 members, has a handsome new hall, behind and connected with the County Buildings: in it is the valuable law library of 5000 volumes, established in 1786.- The Medico-Chirurgical Society (1789), with 30 members, has also its hall, in King Street, which, built (1818-20) at a cost of £2000, is entered by an Ionic portico, and contains a large meeting-room, laboratory, library of 4000 volumes, portraits by Vandyke and T. Miles, etc.-Westward of Union Bridge, the Music Hall Buildings, owned by a limited company (1858), comprise the assembly rooms, erected in 1820 at a cost of £14,500, with portico of six Ionic columns, 30 feet high, and ball, supper, billiard, and other saloons, to which, at a cost of £5000, was added the music hall behind, opened by the Prince Consort on 12th September 1859, with a very fine organ and accommodation for 2000 persons.-The new Theatre and Opera House, in Guild Street, was built in 1872 at a cost of £8400, seats 1650 spectators, and has a frontage of 75, a mean depth of 90, and a height of 50 feet.-The Masonic Hall (1871-76), in Exchange Street, cost £2806, and has a lodge-room, 50 by 32 feet, and 20 high, with three stained windows: the St Katherine's Halls, with an organ, were opened in 1880, in connection with Shiprow Café.-The Public Baths and Swimming Pond (1851-69) are in Crooked Lane: and at the junction of Bridge Place and Windmill Brae is the five-storied Hydropathic and Turkish Bath establishment (1880), with a tower 80 feet high, six plunge baths, and a café. Of 39 inns and hotels, 5 of them temperance, the chief are the Imperial, Palace, Douglas, Lemon-tree, City, Forsyth's, Adelphi, Waverley, and Duffus' Temperance: clubs are the Royal Northern (1854), the City, the Aberdeen Club (1862), and the New Club (1867).

Aberdeen has two native Banks, the Town and County (1825), and the North of Scotland (1836). The former in October 1880 had 1021 partners, 51 branches, a paid-up capital of £252,000, a reserve fund of £126,000, and deposits and credit balances amounting to £1,912, 603: the latter, with 2136 partners and 60 branches, had £394,500 of paid-up capital, £203,441 of reserve fund, and £2,678, 172 of deposits and credit balances. The Town and County has splendid new premises (1863) near the junction of Union and St Nicholas Streets, which, Roman Classic in style, cost £14,000: as also did the North of Scotland Bank (1839), at the corner of Castle and King Streets, whose Corinthian capitols exhibit a delicate minuteness never before attained in granite. There are, besides, the National Security Savings' Bank of Aberdeen (1845), and branches of the following banks, with dates of their establishment:-The Bank of Scotland (1780), the Commercial Bank (1811), the National Bank (1833), the British Linen Co. (1833), the Royal Bank (1862), and the Union Bank (1849), with which was incorporated the Aberdeen Bank (1767). The Scottish Provincial and Northern Assurance Companies were further established here in 1825 and 1836, the one with 20,000 £50 shares, the other with 30,000 £100 shares: and there are 4 navigation companies and about 80 insurance agencies.

The Royal Infirmary, on the western slope of Woolman Hill, was founded in 1740, enlarged in 1753, 1760, and 1820, and wholly rebuilt (1833-40) at a cost of £17,000. A Grecian three-storied edifice, with domed centre and two projecting wings, it is 166 feet long, 112 broad, and 50 high, and, containing 20 large lofty wards with 11 smaller apartments, can accommodate 300 patients. Epidemic wards were built on the links in 1872 at a cost of £2500, and Loch-head House, with 3 acres of ground, was purchased in 1873 for £2250, to serve as a convalescent hospital. In 1879 the total number of patients treated was 1713 at the infirmary, and 172 at the convalescent hospital, besides 2981 outpatients: and the income for 1880 was £6263, the expenditure £6288. The managing committee is elected from a body composed at present of 21 ex officio and 202 life managers, 16 managers by annual subscription, and 46 from presbyteries and churches. Under the same management, but with a separate account, the Royal Lunatic Asylum stands amid grounds of 45 acres, well wooded and tastefully laid out, 1 mile NNW of the corner of Union and St Nicholas Streets. The original building of 1800 cost £3480, and that of 1819 £13,135, of which £10,000 was bequeathed by John Forbes of Newe. Additions have been made from time to time, the latest in 1880: but the most important was the erection in 1862 of Elmhill House for higher-class patients at a cost of £10,866, this being a handsome building in the Italian villa style, designed by William Ramage, whilst the architect of both asylum and infirmary was Archibald Simpson-During 1800-80 the asylum admitted 5682 patients, of whom 1040 died, and 4108 were dismissed as either cured or incurable: and on 31 Dee. 1880 the number of pauper inmates was 361, of private inmates 173, the income for the year ending with the preceding March being £18,391, the expenditure £15,861.-St Nicholas Poorhouse, Nelson Street, with 382 inmates in April 1881, is a Tudor structure, built in 1849 at a cost of £9300, and enlarged in 1869 at a cost of £3350 more.-Other benevolent establishments are the Dispensary, Lying-in, and Vaccine Institution, Guestrow (1823: enlarged and refitted, 1881), which in 1880 dealt with 3327 cases: the Blind Asylum, Huntly Street (1843): the Deaf and Dumb Institution, Belmont Street (1819): the Sick Children's Hospital, Castle Terrace (1877): the Hospital for Orphan and Destitute Female Children, Huntly Street (1849): the Female Orphan Asylum, Albyn Place (1840): the House of Refuge and Night Shelter, George Street (1836): a Magdalene Asylum, Seabank (1864): a Hospital for Incurables, etc. Returns under the Endowed Institutions Act (1869) showed that the city's endowed charities in Sept. 1870 had a total value of £115,068, including upwards of £46,000 belonging to the Guildry, and yielding an annual revenue of £4289.

The East Prison, immediately behind the court-house, is the only gaol of Aberdeen, the West Prison having been discontinued since 1863: and the East itself is shortly to be transferred to a different site. Built in 1831, and enlarged in 1868, it contains 95 cells, and was described as 'bad in situation, with small dark cells, imperfect ventilation, and insufficient accommodation, ' in the Inspector's Report for the year ending 31 March 1879. In the twelvemonth following, 1426 criminal and 58 civil prisoners were confined within it, and its gross expenditure was £1564.-During the same year Oldmill Reformatory (1857), 2¼ miles W of the town, was occupied on an average by 148 boys, and Mount Street Reformatory (1862) by 25 girls, their respective receipts being £2645 and £578.-The Infantry Barracks, on the crest of the Castle Hill, stand on the site of a castle erected as early as 1264, and, as built in 1796 at a cost of £16,000, formed a plain winged oblong of three stories, but were greatly enlarged by the block added (188081) at a further cost of £11,000, with a frontage to Justice Street of 138½ feet.-The King Street Militia Barracks were erected in 1863 at a cost of £10,000 in the old Scottish Castellated style: the Rifle and the Artillery Volunteers have drill-halls in Blackfriars and Queen Streets.

Aberdeen has 62 places of worship, belonging to 14 different denominations. Its parishes-East, West, North, South, Greyfriars, and St Clement's-formed, up to 1828, the single parish of St Nicholas, and still in certain secular respects are one. There are also 8 quoad sacra parishes: and the churches of all 14, with pop. for 1881, communicants for 1878, and ministers' stipends, those marked with asterisks being largely supplemented by the congregations, are:-East (Union Street, 4203, 1629, £300*), West (Union Street, 6325, 928, £300*), North (King Street, 8850, 2346, £300), South (Belmont Street, 2653, 1572, £250*), Greyfriars (Broad Street, 6385, 1185, £250), St Clement's (Footdee, 7528, 1893, £250), Gilcomston (Summer Street, 12,616, 1456, £400), John Knox's (Mounthooly, 6255, 850, £327), Holburn (Wellington Place, 12,634, 972, £380), Ferryhill (4941, 242, £250), Rubislaw (Queen's Cross, 3195, £508), Trinity (Marischal Street, 3064, 213, £250), Rosemount (Caroline Place, 8264, 322, £425), and St George'sin-the-West (John Street, 4452, £200).-The East and West Churches stand in a graveyard of nearly 2 acres, which is separated from Union Street by an Ionic façade, erected (1830) at a cost of £1460, and measuring 147½ feet in length by 32½ in height, with 12 granite columns, each consisting of a single block, and with a central archway. These churches occupy the site of the collegiate St Nicholas, which, as built between 1200 and 1507, had a nine-bayed nave (117 feet by 66), a transept (100 by 20), and a seven-bayed choir (81 by 64), with a trigonal apse over the crypt of Our Lady of Pity. At the crossing a tower rose, with its oaken spire, octagonal and picturesque, to a height of 120 feet: and in it hung three great harmonious bells, of which one, 'Lowrie,' bore date 1352, and was recast in Flanders about 1633. After the Reformation the roodscreen gave place to a wall, and St Nicholas thus was divided into two churches, the western consisting of the former nave, the eastern of the choir, and the Romanesque transept between (known as Drum's and Collison's aisles) serving as vestibule. The West Church, having become dilapidated, was rebuilt (1751-55) from designs by James Gibbs, architect of the Radcliffe Library at Oxford and of the Cambridge Senate House: ' but as if,' says Hill Burton, 'emphatically to show that the fruits of his genius were entirely to be withdrawn from his own countrymen, the only building in Scotland known to have been planned by him, this church in his native city, combines whatever could be derived of gloomy and cumbrous from the character of the Gothic architecture, with whatever could be found of cold and rigid in the details of the Classic.' The East Church, too, was barbarously demolished, and rebuilt(1834-37)in Gothic style: but on 9 Oct. 1874, its roof and interior were destroyed by fire, along with the spire and its peal of bells, increased by 5 in 1859. The total loss was estimated at £30,000, the West Church also being much damaged by water: but all has been since restored, and at a cost of £8500 a fine granite tower and spire erected (1878-80), 190 feet high. The churchyard contains the graves of Principal Guild, Blackwell, Beattie, and Campbell: in the West Church are marble monuments by Bacon and Westmacott, the effigy of Provost Davidson, who fell at Harlaw in 1411, a curious brass portrait-panel of Dr Duncan Liddel, executed at Antwerp in 1622, from a drawing by Jameson probably, and the tombstone of Provost Menzies (d. 1641): whilst, in the southern transept, a small brass to Sir Alexander Irvine of Drum is dated 1400 (Proc. Soc. Ant. Scot., 1876, p. 450).-The North Church, built in 1826 at a cost of £10,500, is a Grecian edifice, modelled apparently after St Pancras in London, measures 120 by 64 feet, and has an imposing Ionic portico, 32 feet high, and a circular tower of 150 feet.- South Church, Gothic, with massive gables and a tower, was built in 1831.-Greyfriars or College Church formed part of St Mary's Observantine friary (1450-1560), and, consisting of a plain old Gothic hall with a modern E aisle, is interesting as the only pre-Reformation church within the municipal burgh: Jameson, the painter, is buried in its churchyard.-St Clement's, founded about 1498 for Footdee fisher-folk, was repaired in 1631, and since has been twice rebuilt, in 1787 and 1828, on the last occasion ' in the Gothic style, with an elegant belfry, 45 feet high: ' an organ was placed in it in 1874. -Trinity Church was built in 1822: John Knox's in 1833: Rubislaw, an ornate freestone edifice, in 1876: Rosemount in 1878: St George's in 1879, etc.

At the Disruption in 1843 every Aberdeen minister and 10,000 lay adherents went out from the Establishment: and now within the burgh there are the following Free churches, with their communicants in 1880, and ministers' incomes:-Bon Accord (Union Terrace, 710, £314), East (Belmont Street, 791, £481), Ferryhill (Rotunda Place, 210, £362), Gaelic (Gaelic Lane, 159, £190 and manse), Gallowgate (202, £182), Gilcomston (Union Street, 742, £502), Greyfriars (George Street, 480), High (Belmont Street, 674, £417), Holburn (Hardgate, 534, £306), John Knox's (Gerrard Street, 798), Mariners' (Commerce Street, 239), Melville (Correction Wynd, 618, £312), North (West North Street, 551), Rutherford (Loanhead Terrace, 432), Ruthrieston (176, £203 and manse), St Clement's (Prince Regent Street, 591, £384), South (Belmont Street, 1197, £532 and manse), Trinity (Crown Street, 733, £445), Union (Shiprow, 342, £210), West (Union Street, 958, £532 and manse), and Causewayend. Of these 21 churches, Melville, the Gaelic, and Union were built for the Establishment in 1772, 1795, and 1822: East, South, and High (1844) form an imposing cruciform pile, Lancet Gothic in style, with a fine brick spire 174 feet high: and the West Church (1869), a Gothic structure in Morayshire sandstone, has a spire of 175 feet, and cost £12,856. Gilcomston Church has also a handsome spire: and another, 150 feet high, adorns a new Free church, built at Queen's Cross (1880-81) at a cost of £7000.

Six U.P. churches, with members in 1879 and ministers' incomes, are-Belmont Street (466, £350), Charlotte Street (597, £300), George Street (437, £310), Nelson Street (137, £199), St Nicholas Lane (374, £300), and St Paul Street (403, £290). For the George Street congregation a new church has been built (1880-81) in Carden Place at a cost of £11,500. There are also 5 Congregational churches, in Belmont Street, Blackfriars Street, Frederick Street, Park Street, and Shiprow (1878): an Associate Synod church, in Skene Terrace: 2 Evangelical Union churches, in John and St Paul Streets: 2 Baptist churches, English in Crown Terrace, Scotch in Academy Street: a Wesleyan Methodist chapel, in Crown Terrace: a Free Methodist chapel, in Dee Street: a Unitarian chapel (1840), in George Street: and a Quakers' meeting-house, in Diamond Street.

The English Episcopalians have had a chapel here since 1721, transferred to St James's, King Street, in 1866: and the Scottish Episcopalians possess 5 churches, with aggregate congregations of some 3000 souls. St Andrew's, King Street, Perpendicular in style, as built in 1817, consisted of an aisled nave (90 by 65 feet), with a marble statue by Flaxman of Bishop John Skinner: in 1880 a beautiful chancel (40 by 28 feet, and 45 high) was added at a cost of over £3000, from designs by Mr G. E. Street, R.A.-St John's (1849-51), in St John's Place, is an Early Middle Pointed structure, comprising chancel, four-bayed nave, and S aisle.-St Mary's (1862), in Carden Place, is Germanised Early First Pointed in style, with strong Romanesque features, and consists of nave (69 by 36 feet, and 60 high) and chancel (51 by 22 feet, and 53 high), with trigonal apse, organ chamber, sacristy, crypt, and a flèche 112 feet high.-St Paul's (1865), in Gallowgate, is Second Pointed, and measures 120 by 60 feet: St Margaret's, Seamont Place, was opened as a mission church in 1870, and consecrated in 1879. There are two Episcopal sisterhoods-St Margaret's (1864) and the Society of Reparation (1870), the latter with orphanage attached: and three Episcopal schools, St Andrew's, St John's, and St Margaret's, with total accommodation for 708 children, had (1879) an average attendance of 548, and grants amounting to £336, 15s. 6d.

The Catholic cathedral of St Mary's of the Assumption, Huntly Street, was built of white granite in 1860 in Second Pointed style, has 1200 sittings, and consists of an aisled nave (156 by 73 feet, and 72 high), into which in 1879 were introduced a chancel arch and a roodscreen, with colossal Crucifix and figures of the Virgin and St John, whilst along the nave are canopied life-size statues of the Twelve Apostles. A large rose window over the new High Altar (1881) is filled, like all the other windows, with rich stained glass; at the W end is a very fine painting of the ' Visitation: ' and the Baptistry contains a beautiful font of polished granite. By 1880 about £15,000 had been already expended on the cathedral and its graceful spire, which, completed in 1877, is 200 feet high, and contains a peal of 9 good bells, the largest of them over 30 cwt. Attached to St Mary's is a Franciscan convent, the nuns having charge of a day and boarding school with 80, and of St Joseph's and St Peter's schools in Constitution Street, with 336 scholars in June 1880, as also of two small orphanages: Nazareth House, on the W side of the city, is a home for the aged and infirm, and for sick and abandoned children, and had then 150 inmates.

Marischal College stands in a court, entered by an old arched gateway from the E side of Broad Street, near its mergence into Gallowgate. The original buildings were those of a Franciscan friary, suppressed at the Reformation. A new edifice, retaining the portions of the old buildings that were not destroyed by fire in 1639, was erected in 1676, and an extension superseding those portions was built in 1740-41. But the whole was unsubstantial and in constant need of repair: and in 1837-41 it was replaced on the same site by a very extensive and most imposing pile, designed by Archibald Simpson, and erected at a cost of £30,000, including a royal grant of £15,000. The new structure, consisting of durable white granite, and in a bold but simple style of collegiate Gothic, forms three sides of a quadrangle (117 by 105 feet), rises to the height of two lofty stories, and presents uniform and striking ranges of mullioned windows. A square tower springs from the side of the quadrangle, and terminates in four ornamental turrets, at a height of 100 feet from the ground: and open arcades, 48 feet long and 16 wide, extend from both sides of the principal entrance. The public school, 74 feet long and 34 wide, is on the ground floor: whilst the hall, 71 feet long, 34 wide, and 32 high, and the library and the museum, each 73 feet long, 34 wide, and 32 high, are all on the upper floor, have ornamental ceilings painted in imitation of oak, and are reached by a lofty staircase, with a massive stone balustrade and a groined ceiling. The public hall contains portraits of the fifth Earl Marischal, Bishop Burnet, Dr Arthur Johnston, Sir Paul Menzies, Andrew Cant, Sir Robert Gordon, and other worthies, several of them by the celebrated Jameson. There are 17 class rooms, and a number of other apartments. A granite obelisk, to the memory of Sir James M 'Grigor, Bart., was erected (1860) in the centre of the quadrangle, and consists of base 16 feet square and 6 high, pedestal 9 feet square and 11 high, plinth 7 feet square and 3 high, and shaft from 5 to 3&ht. feet square and 52 high, having thus a total height of 72 feet. But both this monument and the dinginess of the approach from Broad Street mar the effect of the college buildings. The college was founded in 1593, by George Keith, fifth Earl Marischal. His charter endowed it with the ground and property of the Franciscan, Dominican, and Carmelite friars of Aberdeen, and appointed it to have a principal, 3 regents, 6 alumni, an economist, and a cook. The principal was to be an adept in sacred literature, and to be able to give anatomical and physiological prelections: and the first regent was to teach ethics and mathematics, the second logic, and the third Latin and Greek. The candidates for the chairs were to be nominated by the earl himself and his heirs, and to be examined and admitted by the faculty of King's College, and by the ministers of Aberdeen, Deer, and Fetteresso. The constitution was confirmed immediately by the General Assembly, and a few months afterwards by Parliament. A new charter was given in 1623, by William, Earl Marischal, and a new confirmation made in 1661 by Charles II. All the deeds declared that the masters, members, students, and bursars should be subject to the jurisdiction of the burgh magistrates. An additional regent was appointed within a few years of the foundation: a professorship of mathematics was founded in 1613, a professorship of divinity was added in 1616, and 7 other professorships were founded at different subsequent periods. The senatus, in 1753, directed that the students, after passing through the Latin and Greek classes, should be instructed first, in natural and civil history, geography, chronology, and the elements of mathematics: next, in natural philosophy: and afterwards, in moral philosophy. A few alterations were subsequently made, and these adjusted the aggregate classes into the four faculties of arts, divinity, law, and medicine. But the college, under the University Act of 1858, was united with King's College into one university, with a new constitution, and now it is devoted entirely to the law and medicine classes of the united university. The library, in 1827, contained 11,000 volumes: and, subsequently to that year, received the valuable classical collection of the late Dr James Melvin, and was otherwise considerably enriched.

The Free Church College (1843) occupies a handsome Tudor edifice, with a square tower and an octagonal turret, erected in Alford Place in 1850, at a cost of £2025: possesses 11 scholarships and a library of 17,000 volumes: and in 1880 had a principal, 3 other professors, a lecturer, and 30 students.-The Church of Scotland and Free Church Female Training Colleges, in 1879, had respectively 72 and 68 students, and incomes of £2796 and £2087: for the former, new buildings were opened i1 George Street in 1878: for the latter, in Charlotte Street, in 1880.-The Mechanics' Institution, founded in 1824, and reorganised ten years later, has a hall, with class rooms and a library of 14,000 volumes, in a building erected in Market Street in 1846 for £3500: and schools of science and art have been conjoined therewith since 1853.

The Grammar School, dating from about 1262, shows a list of 26 rectors from 1418 to 1881 and of other classical masters from 1628. The representative secondary school of the North of Scotland, it attracts advanced pupils from the best primary schools, and has close connection, by charter and constitution, with the university. Its teachers, till 1863, were only a rector and 3 classical masters, but number now a rector and 10 under-masters. The building, from 1757 till 1863, was a plain structure, on School Hill, erected at a cost of £400, on part of the grounds of the Dominican Friary, forming three sides of a square, and containing a public hall with four class rooms: and this building it was proposed, in 1880, to fit up as a permanent art gallery and museum. The present Grammar School Buildings, in Skene Street West, were erected in 1861-63 at a cost of £16,605, in the Scottish Baronial style, and contain a rector's room, 52 feet by 30, class rooms, each 40 feet by 28, with accommodation for 1215 boys, a public hall, a library, etc. They were vested in the magistrates and town council and in certain representatives of subscribers: but by the Education Act of 1872 passed to the supervision of the burgh school-board. The curriculum extends over five years, and the number of scholars was 350 at the end of 1880, when the endowment amounted to £668 per annum, including 33 bursaries, founded between 1629 and 1866, and ranging from £20 for four years to £3 for five years.

Gordon's Hospital, of similar character to Heriot's Hospital in Edinburgh, was founded in 1730 by the miser Robert Gordon (1665-1732), a Danzig merchant, who bequeathed it £10,300. Chartered in 1772, and further endowed by Alexander Simpson of Collyhill in 1816, it maintains and educates sons or grandsons of deceased burgesses of guild and of indigent townsfolk generally. It admits boys of from nine to eleven years of age, and, retaining them till fifteen, educates them in English, writing, arithmetic, book-keeping, geography, mathematics, naturall philosophy, drawing, music, French, and Latin, afterwards apprenticing them to proper trades. It is governed by the magistrates, town council, and 4 ministers of Aberdeen: and had 11 masters and 200 pupils in the year ending with Oct. 1880, when its income was £6291, and its expenditure £6759. Its building, Grecian in style, stands in grounds stretch ing northward from School Hill, comprises a centre, erected in 1739 at a cost of £3300, and two wings, with neat connecting colonnades, erected in 1834 at a cost of £14,000 more: presents a frontage to the S, overlooking a lawn: and gives one of the finest views in the city. A marble statue of the founder surmounts the S entrance, and his full-length portrait hangs in the large hall.

The Boys' and Girls' Hospital, founded in 1739, and incorporated in 1852, was in 1871 transferred from Upper Kirkgate and Gallowgate to new buildings in King Street Road. Governed by the Lord Provost, 3 life trustees, and 12 trustees elected annually, it admits poor children of St Nicholas parish, from eight to eleven years of age, and keeping them till fourteen, teaches them reading, writing, arithmetic, grammar, geography, music, and drawing, as also, if girls, sewing, knitting, and household work. In 1880 it had 100 pupils, 60 of whom were boys: and its funds and property amounted at 31 Dec. 1879 to £55,712, the revenue for the year being £2218, and the expenditure £2122.

Composed of 13 members, the Burgh School-Board, in the year ending Whitsunday 1880, had an income of £19,029 (school fees, £6651: Government grants, £4846: school rate, £7101, etc.), and expended £18,777, including £12,451 for teachers' salaries. On 31 - Oct. 1880, it reported 72 elementary schools, with gross accommodation for 16,595 and an average attendance of 13,087 children, viz., 12 hospital and industrial schools (accom. 2613: and attendance 994): 16 academies and ladies' schools (2274 and 1025): 15 private adventure or dame schools (558 and 549): 11 non-public but State-aided schools (3850 and 3450): and 18 public schools (6800 and 7069). The board's own schools, with average attendance, number of children examined, and Government grant in 1880, are-Albion Street (346,279, £280,17s.): Causewayend (759,586, £692): Commerce Street (537,404, £479,6s.): Davidson's (170,114, £149,12s. 4d.): Dr Brown's (323,255, £284,10s.): Ferryhill (465,352, £418,15s.): Marywell Street (328,242, £284,19s.): Middle (744,610, £693,9s.): Northfield (435,338, £379,0s. 6d.): Port Hill (579,510, £397,16s. 6d.): Princes Street (208,148, £162,13s.): St Andrew's Street (290,220, £264,17s.): St Clement Street (450,337, £420,3s.): St Paul Street (491,367, £429,12s. 6d.): Skene Street (409,329, £376,17s.): and Trinity (141,97, £112,8s.).

Aberdeen till lately had no public gardens, a want the more felt from the scarcity of any large open spaces within the city: but the Victoria Park in 1872, and the Union Terrace Gardens in 1879, were laid out at a cost respectively of £4248 and £5110. The former lying on the NW outskirts of the town, near the Lunatic Asylum, is 13 acres in extent, measuring some 400 by 225 yards, and at its centre has a handsome granite fountain, presented by the master masons and workers of Aberdeen: whilst Union Terrace Gardens, with well-grown elm and ash trees, planted in 1775, had served for some years as a convenient ' toom,' and extending northwards from Union Bridge along the W side of the Denburn Valley, here spanned now by another bridge leading to School Hill, have an utmost length and breadth of about 250 and 50 yards. In July 1880, too, it was intimated that Miss Duthie of Ruthrieston contemplated the formation of a carriage drive along the river, from the reclaimed ground to Bridge of Dee, as also, at a cost of £30,000, of a public park of 47 acres at Arthurseat, near Allenvale Cemetery, its first sod being cut on 27 Aug. 1881. Aberdeen's best recreation ground, however, will always remain the Links, a stretch of velvety sward and broken sandhills (the highest, Broad Hill, 94 feet), which, 410 acres in area, extends for 2 miles along the fine level sands. Here are the battery, lifeboat house, bathing station, and golf club house: and here, too, cricket and football are played, cattle shows and wapenshaws held, as well as the autumn horse races, revived in 1876.

The Cross, at the upper end of Castle Street, is a Renaissance, open-arched, hexagonal structure of freestone, adorned with medallions of the seven Jameses. From its centre springs a column with Corinthian capitol, surmounted by a unicorn that bears an escutcheon charged with the Scottish lion, the basement being 21 feet in diameter and 18 high, the column 12½ feet more. The workmanship of John Montgomery, mason of Old Rayne, it first was erected, in 1686, before the Tolbooth, near the site of the Flesh and Fish Crosses, and was transferred to its present position in 1842.-The monument (1836) of George, fifth Duke of Gordon, Scott's ' Cock of the North,' stands 30 yards lower down, and consists of a granite statue and pedestal, the one 11½, the other 10¼ feet high, and the latter flanked by two heavy pieces of ordnance, taken at Sebastopol in 1855.-At the NW corner of Union Bridge, in a circular recess, is Baron Marochetti's bronze seated statue of the Prince Consort, in field-marshal's uniform, the jack-boots very prominent. The figure is 6½ feet high, its pedestal of polished Peterhead granite 8: and it was unveiled in presence of Her Majesty, 13 Oct. 1863.-A statue of the Queen herself, by the late Alexander Brodie, of Aberdeen, was placed in 1866 at the junction of Union and St Nicholas Streets. Of white Sicilian marble, and 8½ feet high, it stands on a pedestal of polished Peterhead granite, 10½ feet more. -A colossal bronze statue of Sir William Wallace, ' returning defiant answer to the English ambassadors before the battle of Stirling Bridge,' is also soon to be erected, Castle Street having been chosen for its site in June 1880, and Mr John Steill, of Edinburgh, having left £4000 for the purpose.

The only noticeable bridge within the city is Telford's Union Bridge, in the line of Union Street, over the Denburn (now the railway) Valley. Besides three blind arches, one on the W and two on the E, it has an open arch of 132 feet span, with parapets 52 feet above the ground below, is 70 feet wide, with carriage-way of 21, and was constructed (1800-3) at a cost of £13,342.-Dee Bridge, 1½ mile SW of Union Place, was till recent time the only great thoroughfare over the Dee from Aberdeen to the south, and, though rurally situated, is connected with the city by a chain of suburbs, and is under the management of the town council. It originated in a bequest of £20,000, left by Bishop Elphinstone, to build a bridge across the Dee near Aberdeen. He died 25 Oct. 1514: and his successor, Bishop Gavin Dunbar, carried out the intention of the legacy, and finished the bridge in 1527. Consisting of 7 arches, each of 50 feet span, this bridge eventually fell into decay, was restored (1718-21) out of funds belonging to itself, and was widened (1841-42) from 14½ to 26 feet, and otherwise greatly improved, at a cost of £7250.-Wellington Suspension Bridge, spanning the Dee at Craiglug in the vicinity of Ferryhill, 1½ mile below Dee Bridge, was erected in 1831 at a cost of £10,000, and is 220 feet long by 22 wide. - The Railway Viaduct (1848), on the Aberdeen section of the Caledonian, crosses the Dee transversely, 3 furlongs above the Suspension Bridge, and designed by Messrs Locke & Errington, consists of 7 irongirder arches, each about 50 feet in span, with two land arches at its northern end.-Victoria Bridge, over the Dee's new channel, in a line with Market Street and Cross Quay, is a granite five-arch structure, opened on 2 July 1881, having cost £25,000.-The Auld Brig o' Balgownie, built about 1320, either by Bishop Cheyne or by King Robert Bruce, crosses the Don, 2½ miles N by W of Castle Street. A single Gothic arch, narrow and steep, of 67 feet span and 34½ high above the black deep salmon pool below, it is commemorated by Byron in Don Juan, where a note records how a dread prediction made him pause to cross it, and yet lean over it with a childish delight. For he was his mother's only son, and the prophecy runs:-

Brig o' Balgownie, black's your wa' (or, though wight be your wa'),
wi' a wife's ae son. and a meer's ae foal,
Down ye shall fa' !

In 1605 Sir Alexander Hay left lands of a yearly value of £2, 8s. 5½d. to keep the Auld Brig in repair: its accumulated funds amounted (1872) to £23,153, though out of those funds in 1825 was built the new Bridge of Don, 502 yards lower down, for £17,100. With five semicircular arches, each about 86 feet in span, this last is 26½ feet wide and 41 high.

The Aberdeen railway, amalgamated (1866) with the Caledonian, was opened for traffic up to Guild Street terminus in 1848: and the Great North of Scotland was opened from Huntly to Kittybrewster in 1854, and thence extended, two years afterwards, to Waterloo terminus. The break-700 yards of crowded quays- between these termini had proved a great hindrance to intercommunication, when, in 1864, the two companies were empowered to construct the Denburn Valley line, on a capital of £190,000, of which the Great North of Scotland subscribed £125,000. The junction railway runs 1¾ mile north-north-westward from Guild Street to Kittybrewster, being carried beneath Union Bridge, and through two short tunnels under Woolman Hill and Maberley Street: and the Great North Company abandoned their Waterloo branch, except for goods traffic, on the opening (1867) of the new Joint Guild Street station, which, over 500 feet long by 100 wide, is one of the finest stations in Scotland, its lofty iron-girder roof being modelled after that of Victoria station, Pimlico.-Street tramways, 2 miles, 54 chains long, on the line of Union, King, St Nicholas, and George Streets, were opened in 1874, and extended to Mannofield in 1880, their aggregate cost of construction being £18,791, whilst, in the year ending June 1879, the passengers numbered 957,115, and the receipts amounted to £5080, the expenditure to £3959.

From a cistern, formed about 1766 at the head of Broad Street, and fed by the Fountainhall and other streams, 187,200 gallons of water were daily obtained: but this supply proving insufficient, the police commissioners resolved in 1830 to supplement it from the Dee. A pump-house was accordingly erected near the N end of the Bridge of Dee: but its two engines, each of 50 horse-power, could daily raise through a 15-inch main no more than 1,000,000 gallons to a granite reservoir at the W end of Union Street, which, with storage capacity of 94,728 gallons, stood 40 feet higher than the street itself, and 130 higher than the pumpingstation. This fresh supply, too, proving quite inadequate, the commissioners next resolved, in 1862, to supersede pumping by gravitation, and to that end procured powers to abstract between 2,500,000 and 6,000,000 gallons daily from the Dee at Cairnton, 23 miles up the river, and 224 feet above the level of the sea. Similar to those of Glasgow, and rivalled in Scotland by them alone, the new Aberdeen waterworks we planned by the late James Simpson, C.E., of London. An aqueduct from Cairnton intake passes, by tunnel, through half a mile of rock, and thence goes half a mile further to Invercanny reservoir, in which 10,000,000 gallons can be stored, and from which the main aqueduct, 18 miles long, leads to the reservoir at Brae of Pitfodels. This, 1½ mile WSW of Union Place, and 162 feet above sea-level, can hold 6,000,000 gallons: and a high-service reservoir on Hillhead of Pitfodels (420 feet) contains about 500,000 more. Commenced in the spring of 1864, the waterworks were opened by the Queen on Oct. 16,1866: their cost, which was estimated at £103,999, had reached £161,524 in 1872. During the three months April to June 1880, the daily water consumption was 4,378,780 gallons, 4,144,000 being from the low-service, and 234,780 from the high-service reservoir: while, for the twelvemonth ending with the September following, the water account showed an income of £13,023, and an outlay of £11,426.

Aberdeen has good natural drainage facilities, but has been slow to turn them to account. In 1865 there were but two or three common sewers in the new principal streets, besides the Denburn, the Holburn on the S, the Powis or Tyle Burn on the N, and a few tinier rills. Furnishing water-power to numerous works, these streams threw up the filth that they received: the Denburn, too, though often in summer almost dry, and though the outlet, within 600 yards, of between 40 and 50 minor sewers, was disposed in cascades, and carried along an ornamental channel. Small wonder to find it described as ' highly polluted, ' as ' bringing down to its mouth at the harbour a thick and fetid slime that exhales, at low water, great volumes of poisonous gas: ' nay, even in the best quarters of the city some houses were solely drained into back-garden cesspools. Much has been done since then: the Denburn in its lower course having been covered over, and £62,695 expended during 1867-72 on the purchase of old, and the construction of new, sewers within the municipal bounds. In 1875, however, these works were described by Mr Alexander Smith, C.E., as far from perfect, ' the main sewers having been laid in zones, almost on deadlevel intercepting sewers with reversible outfalls, instead of being laid in a position to take advantage of the natural outfalls. ' By one of the four main sewers 44 acres of the Spital lands were successfully irrigated in 1871: and in 1876 it was proposed thus to utilise all the sewage of the low-lying parts of the city, 624 acres being required for the purpose. Two schemes were laid before the town council, the cost of one being £31,221, of the other £29,540. In 1880 a surplus of £130 remained on the sewerage account, and of £336 on that of the public health.-The earliest Gas Light Company (1824) had their works near the present site of Guild Street station, whilst a new company (1840) had theirs at the Sandilands, just off the links: and on these companies' amalgamation, the former premises were sold to the Scottish North Eastern. In 1871 the Sandilands works themselves were acquired by the corporation at a total cost of £120,809.

For ages a mere expanse of open water, the harbour, so far back as the 14th century, seems to have been protected by a bulwark, repaired or rebuilt in 1484. A stone pier on the S side of the channel was formed between 1607 and 1610, in which latter year a great stone, called Knock Maitland or Craig Metellan, was removed from the harbour's entry ' by the renowned art and industrie of that ingenious and vertuous citizen, David Anderson of Finzeauch, from his skill in mechanics popularly known as Davie do a' thing.' The eastward extension of the wharf, whereby a fine meadow of ground was reclaimed, was carried on slowly (1623-59), and before 1661 a shipbuilding dock had been constructed at Footdee: but, all improvements notwithstanding, navigation continued difficult and perilous, owing to a bar of sand, on which at low tide was scarcely 2 feet of water. To remedy this evil, the magistrates in 1770 procured a plan from Smeaton, in accordance wherewith the new N pier was built (1775-81) at a cost of £18,000. Curving slightly northwards, it had a length of 1200 feet, a height of from 16 to 30 feet, and a breadth of from 20 to 36 feet at the base, of from 12 to 24 at the top, its dimensions increasing seawards. By Telford this pier was extended (1810-16) to a further length of almost 900 feet, at a cost of £66,000: and to protect it, a southern breakwater, nearly 800 feet long, was finished in 1815, at a cost of £14,000 more. The next great undertaking was the construction (1840-48) of the Victoria Dock, 28 acres in extent-7½ above Regent Bridge, -with 2053 yards of wharfage, and tide-locks 80 feet wide, the depth of water on whose sill is 21 feet at ordinary spring tides. This left about 18 acres of tidal harbour, and so things stood till Dec. 1869, when was commenced the southward diversion of the Dee from the Suspension Bridge downwards. The new channel, curving a little over a mile, and at its bottom 170 feet wide, was completed at a cost of £51,585 in 1872, the total sum expended on harbour improvements up to that date since 1810 amounting to £1,509,638. Other works under the Act of 1868 have been the building of a new S breakwater of concrete, 1050 feet long and 47 high, at a cost of £76,443 (1870-73): a further extension of the N pier by 500 feet, at a cost of £44,000 (1874-77): and the filling up of the Dee's old bed, on which, in a line with the dock-gates, it is now (1881) proposed to form a graving-dock, 559 by 74 feet, as also gradually to rearrange the docks at a total cost of £72,000, by building a new end to the Victoria Dock, with bridge and railway across, removing Regent Bridge and approaches, lowering the dock-sill, providing a caisson bridge, etc. Girdleness Lighthouse, with two fixed lights, 115 and 185 feet above mean tide, was built in 1833 to the S of the harbour entrance, which, widened now to 400 yards, leads out of Aberdeen Bay, a safe enough anchorage this with offshore winds, though not with a NE, E, or SE wind. Valued at £13,874 in 1881, the harbour is managed by 19 commissioners chosen from the town council, and by 12 other elected commissioners. The aggregate tonnage registered as belonging to the port was 310 in 1656, 4964 in 1788, 17,131 in 1810, 34,235 in 1821,3 0,460 in 1831, 38,979 in 1841, 50,985 in 1851, 74,232 in 1861, 99,936 in 1871, 119,184 in 1879, and 118,182 on 31 Dec. 1880, viz.,-158 sailing vessels of 92,217, and 53 steamships of 25,965 tons. The harbour revenue, again, was £7215 in 1811, £9161 in 1821, £12,239 in 1831, £18,657 in 1841, £20,190 in 1851, £28,436 in 1861, £32,292 in 1871, and £43,645 in 1879, when the expenditure was £36,634. Both lists show almost constant growth: as likewise does the following table, giving the aggregate tonnage of vessels that entered and cleared from and to foreign ports and coastwise, in cargoes, and also-for the three last years -in ballast:-

EnteredCleared
 British.For'gnTotal.British.For'gnTotal
1845269,7318,781278,512211,1173,639214,756
1856283,83110,072293,903209,9562,286212,242
1869339,29932,815372,114202,63013,512216,142
1874431,11045,908477,018433,78142,971476,752
1879486,58134,566521,147479,21833,175512,393
1880482,13251,907534,039471,04448,419519,463

Of the total, 2325 vessels of 534,039 tons, that entered in 1880,1203 of 368,355 tons were steamers, 134 of 12,825 tons were in ballast, and 1969 of 439,451 tons were coasters: whilst the total, 2122 of 512,393 tons, of those that cleared included 1177 steamers of 357,777 tons, 1066 vessels in ballast of 222,419 tons, and 2078 coasters of 467,306 tons. The trade is mainly, then, a coasting, and more an import than an export one: and coal is a chief article of import, 277,356 tons having been received coastwise here in 1879. Other imports are lime, flax, hemp, jute, wool, timber, oats, wheat, maize, flour, salt, iron, bones, guano, etc.: exports are flax and cotton fabrics, woollen cloths, grain, oatmeal, cattle, horses, sheep, pigs, pork, butter, eggs, salmon, preserved meats, granite, and Scotch pine timber. The amount of customs in 1862 was £92,963: in 1868, £80,415: in 1869, £77,447: in 1879, £98,632.

Shipbuilding was carried on as early as the 15th century, and in the days of wooden ships, the Aberdeen 'clipper bow,' of Messrs Hall's invention, won for itself a wide repute. Its fame endures, but iron since 1839 has by degrees been superseding wood, in spite of remoteness from coal and iron fields. During 1832-36 there were built here 38 vessels of 6016 tons, and during 1875-79 48 of 28,817 tons, of which 22 of 9595 tons were steamers: in 1880 the number was 7 of 5849 tons, all of them iron steamships. Aberdeen is head of the fishery district between Montrose and Peterhead, in which, during 1878, there were cured 93,344 barrels of white herrings, besides 51,800 cod, ling, and hake, taken by 374 boats of 3158 tons, the persons employed being 1006 fishermen and boys, 53 fish-curers, 194 coopers, and 3970 others: and the aggregate value of boats, nets, and lines, being estimated at £34,261. For 1880 the herring catch was returned as 77,975 crans, against 76,125 in 1877, 68,740 in 1878, and 36,000 in 1879.

The manufactures of Aberdeen are at once extensive and varied, its industrial establishments in 1881 including 3 comb, 1 cotton, 3 linen, 10 woollen and wincey, 1 carpet, 2 tape, 3 soap and candle, 3 tobacco and snuff, and 3 pipe factories: 2 paper mills: the Rubislaw bleachfields: 8 breweries: 4 distilleries: 4 chemical works: 16 engineering, iron-founding, boiler, and agricultural implement works: 4 saw, 2 file, 6 gun, and 4 brush factories: 25 mills and meal stores: 5 tanning or currying works: 12 rope, twine, and sail factories: 2 brickfields, etc., with-last but not least -the yards of 53 granite polishers and 6 stone merchants.-The hosiery trade of Scotland began in Aberdeen, with which the African Company (1695) contracted for woollen stockings: and at the time when Pennant wrote (1771), 69,333 dozen pairs of stockings were yearly produced here, these being worth about 30s. per dozen, and being chiefly exported to Holland, for dispersion thence through Germany. But the trade has since dwindled into insignificance. -The linen manufacture, introduced about 1745, soon grew so large as to pay some £5000 a-year in wages: and now, in the articles of thread, sailcloth, osnaburgs, brown linens, and sacking, employs between 2000 and 3000 hands. The thread manufacture was introduced at a later date than the spinning: was soon carried to great perfection: and employed 600 men, 2000 women, and 100 boys in 1795, when the sailcloth manufacture was commenced.-Several large flax-spinning factories were established on the Don, near Old Aberdeen, about 1800. - The woollen manufacture, in the beginning of last century, comprised chiefly coarse slight cloths, called plaidens and fingroms. These were made by the farmers and cottagers from the wool of their own sheep, by the citizens from wool supplied by country hillfarms, and were mostly exported to Hamburg. Woollen factories were established in the city about 1748: are still there of considerable extent: and belong to the same proprietors as factories at Garlogie and Don, with these consuming about 2,000,000 lbs. of wool per annum, and employing upwards of 1400 hands. The carpet manufacture has an annual value of about £50,000, the tweed manufacture (at Grandholm employing nearly 600 hands) of more than £120,000, and the wincey manufacture of at least £250,000. The aggregate woollen trade employs at least 600 handlooms, 230 power-looms, and 3000 or more persons: and annually produces upwards of 3,000,000 yards of fabrics.-Banner Mill is now the only cotton factory, but is so extensive as to employ above 650 hands.-The meat-preserving trade of Scotland was commenced at Aberdeen in 1822: made slow progress for a time, till it overcame prejudice and created a market: began by preserving salmon for exportation, and proceeded to the preserving of meats, game, soups, and vegetables: is now carried on in several establishments: employs upwards of 500 persons, produces preserved provisions to the annual value of about £221,000: supplies a large proportion of the meat stores to ships sailing from Glasgow, Liverpool, and London: and has extensive connection with India, China, and Australia. Salmon, caught chiefly in the Dee and Don, appears to have been exported from as early as 1281, and was shipped to the Continent towards the end of the 17th century, at the rate of about 360 barrels yearly, of 250 lbs. each. The quantity sent to London, during the seven years 1822-28, amounted to 42,654 boxes, and during the eight years 1829-36 to 65,260 boxes: but later years have witnessed a decline. Dried whitings and haddocks, sometimes called Aberdeen haddocks from their being shipped at Aberdeen, oftener called Findon or Finnan haddocks from a village about 6 miles to the S where they were originally dried for the market, are a considerable article of commerce coastwise as far as to London. Beef and mutton also are largely prepared for exportation: and, together with live stock, are forwarded to the southern markets to the value of about £1,000,000 a-year. - Steam - engines, anchors, chains, cables, and all kinds of machinery are manufactured in extensive ironworks at Ferryhill, Footdee, and other localities.-Rope-making, paper-making, soapmaking, comb-making, and leather manufacture also are carried on.-The granite trade has been associated with Aberdeen for fully 300 years: and now it makes a very great figure. Effective quarrying was not begun till about 1750, nor the exporting till 1764: whilst the use of machinery in quarrying dates only from about 1795, the dressing of the granite into regular cubes from 1800, and the polishing of granite for manufacture into monuments, columns, fountains, etc., from 1818. But now the trade in dressed blocks for paving, bridges, wharves, docks, and lighthouses, and so forth, is gigantic: while that in polished granite, or in numerous and diversified ornamental articles of polished granite, at once exercises remarkable artistic skill, and is considerably and increasingly extensive. Upwards of 80,000 tons of granite are quarried annually in Aberdeenshire and the contiguous parts of Kincardineshire, and more than half of the quantity quarried is exported. The quarrying employs upwards of 1000 hands: the transporting and the working employ a proportionally large number of hands, and the polishing and constructing into ornamental objects employ very many skilled workmen. The tons of granite exported from Aberdeen were 25,557 in 1840, 30,385 in 1850, 32,023 in 1865, 43,790 in 1867, and upwards of 50,000 in 1868.

A weekly grain market is held on Friday: a linen market, on the Green, is held on the last Wednesday of April: a wool market, also on the Green, is held on Thursday and Friday of the first week of June, and of the first and second weeks of July: and a market for wooden utensils, in Castle Street, is held on the last Wednesday of August: but none of these, except the weekly one, is now of importance. Hiring markets are held in Castle Street on several Fridays about Whitsunday and Martinmas.

A printing-press was started by Edward Raban in 1621, from which in 1626 the earliest Scottish almanac was issued, and in 1748 the Aberdeen Journal, the oldest newspaper N of the Forth. There now are 16 printing-offices, and 7 newspapers-the daily a1d Saturday Conservative Journal (1748), the Saturday Liberal Herald (1806), the Liberal Daily Free Press (1853), the Tuesday Northern Advertiser (1856), the Saturday Liberal People's Journal (1858), the Saturday Weekly News (1864), and the Evening Express (1879). -The Spalding Club was instituted in 1839, for printing historical, ecclesiastical, genealogical, topographical, and literary remains of the north-eastern counties of Scotland: and issued to its members nearly 40 volumes of great interest and value, including Dr Stewart's Sculptured Stones of Scotland and The Book of Deer; but it came to a close in 1870. See John Stuart's Notices of the Spalding Club (1871).

The Town Council consists of a Lord Provost, 6 bailies, 6 office-bearers, 12 councillors, and 8 others: and the municipal constituency numbered 1902 in 1841, 2961 in 1851, 2701 in 1861, 9347 in 1871, and 12,193 in 1881. The corporation revenue was £15,184 in 1832, £18,648 in 1840, £16,894 in 1854, £11,376 in 1864, £11,447 in 1870, £12,560 in 1874, and (including assessments and gas revenue) £122,328 in 1880, when for the twelvemonth ending with September, the revenue on the general purposes account was £28,699, the expenditure £25, 450, and the outlay on capital account £73,044. By the Aberdeen Municipality Extension Act of 1871, the powers of the former commissioners of police were transferred to the town council, the business of the police department being thenceforth managed by separate committees. The watching force for city and harbour consists of a superintendent (salary £350), 2 lieutenants, 3 inspectors, 4 detectives, 9 sergeants, 87 constables, and a female turnkey, the total cost of that force being £6955, 10s. in 1878: and the number of persons arrested was 1959 in 1875, 2085 in 1876, 1939 in 1877, 1077 in 1878, 1873 in 1879, and 1988 in 1880, of which last number 1817 were tried, and 1755 convicted. The sheriff court for the county is held in the Court-House on Wednesdays and Fridays, the small debt court on Thursdays, the debts recovery court on Fridays, the commissary court on Wednesdays, and the general quarter sessions on the first Tuesday of March, May, and August, and the last Tuesday of October.- The parliamentary constituency numbered 2024 in 1834, 3586 in 1861, and 14,146 in 1881, of whom 3037 belonged to the First Ward, 3842 to the Second, 3313 to the Third, 1997 to the Fourth, 522 to the Fifth or Ruthrieston, 849 to the Sixth or Woodside, and 586 to the Seventh or Old Aberdeen. The burgh returns one member to Parliament-always a Liberal since 1837, the present member polling 7505 votes in 1880 against his opponent's 3139.-The annual value of real property within the parliamentary burgh, assessed at £101,613 in 1815, has risen since the passing of the Valuation Act from £178,168 in 1856, to £193,336 in 1861, £226,534 in 1866, £283,650 in 1871, £323,197 in 1876, and (exclusive of £14,403 for railways, tramways, and waterworks) £414,864,4s. in 1881, this last sum being thus distributed:-East parish, £28,428, 4s. 11d.: West, £36,815,17s. 2d.: North, £27,802, 3s. 10d.: South, £37,085,15s. 1d.: Greyfriars, £23,298, 8s.: St Clement's, £48,744,7s. 8d.: Old Machar, £212,410, 17s. 4d.: and Banchory-Devenick, £278, 10s. -The population is said to have numbered 2977 in 1396, 4000 in 1572, 5833 in 1581, 8750 in 1643, 5556 in 1708, and 15,730 in 1755, the last being that of the parliamentary burgh, which during the present century is shown by the Census thus to have increased-(1801) 26,992, (1811) 34,649, (1821) 43,821, (1831) 56,681, (1841) 63,288, (1851) 71,973, (1861) 73,805, (1871) 88,189, (1881) 105,082, of whom 399 belonged to the City Poorhouse, 247 to the Royal Infirmary, 186 to the shipping, 21 to the Naval Reserve, 49,678 (26,465 females) to St Nicholas, and 54,551 (30,429 females) to Old Machar, the subdivisions of these two last being given under the Churches, on p. 9.

Old Aberdeen, though falling within the parliamentary burgh, and though barely 1½ mile N by W of Castle Street, yet merits separate notice as an independent burgh of regality, as a quondam episcopal city, and as the seat of a university. Consisting chiefly of a single street, it commences at Spital, near the N end of Gallowgate, and thence extends a good mile northward to the immediate vicinity of the Don. With its gardens and orchards, it wears a quiet countrified appearance, and, but for a few modern villas here and there, might almost be said to have remained three centuries unchanged. The northern end is strikingly picturesque, the Chanonry there, or ancient cathedral precinct, containing once cathedral, episcopal palace, deanery, prebends' lodgings, etc., and though now stripped of some of its features, presenting still in the massive form and short spiked steeples of the cathedral, amid a cluster of fine old trees on the crown of a bank sloping down to the Don, a scene of beauty hardly excelled by aught of the kind in Britain.

The Town-House stands about 300 yards S of the cathedral: was built in 1702, and renovated towards the end of the century: and contains a large hall, a council-room, and other official chambers. -The cross stood in front of the site of the Town-House, included a stepped pedestal, and a shaft surmounted by a figure of the Virgin: and was defaced at the Reformation, removed when the Town-House was rebuilt.-A well at the Town-House was formed in 1769, with a cistern in what had been called the Thief's Hole: and was provided with 625 yards of piping.-The entrance-gate to Powis' Garden fronts the College buildings, has a lofty round tower on either side, surmounted by gilded crescents, and forms a marked feature in the burghal landscape.-The Hermitage crowning an eminence in Powis' Garden is another picturesque object: and a conical mount, the Hill of Tillydrone, a little W of the cathedral, is said by some to have been artificially formed by Bruce's soldiers for a watchguard station: by others, to have served for beacon fires: by others, to have been the seat of ancient civil, criminal, or ecclesiastical courts.

The exact date of the erection of the see of Aberdeen is unknown, the legend of its original foundation by Malcolm II. at Mortlach in Banffshire resting on five forged documents. Thence it is said to have been transferred by David I. (1124-53), but all that is certain is that a charter granted by the Mormaer of Buchan for refounding the church of Deer early in David's reign was witnessed by ' Nectan, Bishop of Aberdeen,' whilst a bull by Pope Adrian IV. confirmed in 1157 to Edward, Bishop of Aberdeen, the church of Aberdeen and the church of St Machar, with the town of Old Aberdeen and other lands (Skene's Celt. Scot.,vol. ii., 1876, p. 378). Down to the Reformation, the see was held by 26 bishops, the twelfth of whom, Alexander Kininmonth II. (1356-80), laid the foundations of the present Cathedral of SS. Mary and Machar, preserving nothing of two earlier structures. The work was carried on by his successors, and in 1532 the cathedral presented a five-bayed nave, an aisleless choir, a transept, ladychapel, and consistory, with two western octagonal steeples 113½ feet high, and a great central tower of freestone, rising 150 feet, in which hung 14 bells. Destruction soon succeeded to construction, for the Mearns rabble in 1560 despoiled the cathedral of all its costly ornaments, demolishing the choir: the transepts were crushed by the fall of the central tower in 1688. All that remains is the nave, now the parish church (126 by 67½ feet), a parvised S porch, the western towers, and fragments of the transept walls, containing the richly sculptured but mutilated tombs of Henry de Lichtoun (d. 1440), Gavin Dunbar (d. 1532), and a third unknown bishop. The only granite cathedral in the world, this, although dating from the Second Pointed age, has many survivals of the Norman style, notably its short massive rounded piers and plain unmoulded ' storm ' or clerestory windows: other features are the great western window, divided by six long shafts of stone, a low-browed doorway beneath it with heavy semicircular arch, and the finely carved pulpit, a relic of the wood-carvings, that else were hewn in pieces in 1649. The plainness of the whole is redeemed by the carvi1g and gilding of a flat panelled oaken ceiling, emblazoned with the arms of 48 benefactors, and restored in 1869-71, when two galleries also were removed, and other improvements effected under the supervision of the late Sir G. G. Scott at a total cost of £4280. Five stained-glass windows, too, have been inserted (1871-74), the western to the Duke of Gordon's memory, another to that of the Aberdonian painters, Jameson, Phillip, and Dyce. (See Billings, vol. i., 1848: and Walcott's Scoti-Monasticon, 1874, with authorities cited there).-E of the cathedral the bishop's palace (c. 1470), with a large fair court and 4 high towers, stood near the site of the present residence of the Divinity Professor: to the S stood the deanery, on ground now occupied by Old Machar Manse: and to the W was a hospital founded in 1532 by Bishop Gavin Dunbar for 12 poor bedesmen: its revenues now are distributed to 18 men in their own homes.-A church and a hospital, dedicated to St Peter, stood within Spital burying-ground, near the S end of the town; and another church, St Mary ad Nives, commonly called Snow Kirk, stood behind houses a little NW of the Spital burying-ground. Both churches, by an act of Parliament in 1583, were united to the cathedral church. The western portion of Spital burying-ground is very ancient, but the eastern is recent: the Snow Kirk burying-ground is now the Roman Catholic cemetery.-The Free church, the only place of worship now in Old Aberdeen besides the cathedral, stands about midway between it and King's College, and is a neat edifice, renovated in 1880.

King's College stands on the E side of the main street, nearly ½ mile S of the cathedral. It was begun in 1500, and now exhibits a mixture of architecture, mediæval and modern. Its original form, a complete quadrangle, with three towers, is depicted in a curious painting of the 17th century, preserved within the college: but one of these towers has perished, another is only a fragment. The third, 100 feet high, was rebuilt about 1636 at the NW corner, and is a massive structure, buttressed nearly to the top, and bearing aloft a lantern of crossed rib arches, surmounted by a beautiful imperial crown, with finial cross. Lantern and crown somewhat resemble those of St Giles', Edinburgh, and St Nicholas', Newcastle-on-Tyne: but they have much less of the spire about them, and are far more in keeping with the spirit of Gothic architecture. The adjoining western or street front is a reconstruction of 1826, and, Perpendicular in style, is out of harmony with the tower. The entire original college appears to have been executed in a mixture of the Scottish and the French Gothic styles: and was specially distinguished by the retention of the semicircular arch, at a time long subsequent to the general use of the pointed arch throughout England. Much of that pile still stands, preserving all its original features, and serving as one of the best extant specimens of the Scottish architecture of its period. The W side of the quadrangle is disposed in class-rooms: the S side consists of plain building, with a piazza: and the E side contains the common hall, 62 by 22½ feet, enriched with portraits and with Jameson's famous paintings of the Ten Sibyls. The N side contains the chapel and the library, and for interior character is deeply interesting. The chapel is the choir of the original college church, and has canopied stalls of beautifully carved black oak, with screens of the same material, ' which,' says Hill Burton, ' for beauty of Gothic design and practical finish, are perhaps the finest piece of carved work existing in the British Empire.' The tomb of Bishop Elphinstone is in the middle of the chapel, and was once highly ornamented, but is now covered with an uninscribed slab of black marble. The library is the former nave, measures 58 feet by 29, retains the original W window of the church, and is separated from the chapel by a partition wall. The university library possesses more than 90,000 volumes, and there are also museums of natural history, medicine, archæology, etc.

A scholastic institution, serving as a germ of the college, existed from the time of Malcolm IV. The college itself originated in a bull of Pope Alexander VI., obtained by application of James IV., on supplication of Bishop Elphinstone, for a university to teach theology, canon and civil law, medicine, and the liberal arts, and to grant degrees. The bull was issued in 1494, but did not take effect till 1505. The college was dedicated to the Holy Trinity and the Virgin Mary, but being placed under the immediate protection of the king came to be known as King's College. James IV. and Bishop Elphinstone endowed it with large revenues. Six teachers for life and five for a certain number of years, were to carry on its tuition. The primus was styled principal, and was to be a master of theology: the second, third, and fourth were the doctors of canon and civil law and of medicine: the fifth was styled regent and subprincipal, and was to be a master of arts: the sixth was to teach literature, and to be also a master of arts: the five not holding their positions for life were likewise to be masters of arts: and all eleven, except the doctor of medicine, were to be ecclesiastics. A faithful model of the University of Paris, King's College, with its four ' nations ' of Mar, Buchan, Moray, and Angus, partook partly of a monastic, partly of an eleemosynary, character: but, as it progressed, it underwent change, at once in its practical working, in the staff of its professors, and in the amount of its endowments. It became comparatively very wealthy towards the era of the Reformation, and had it been allowed to retain the wealth which it had then acquired it might at the present day have vied with the great colleges of England: but, through the grasping avarice of Queen Mary's courtiers, it was deprived of much of its property. It, however, received some new possessions from Charles I.: it had, in 1836, an income of £2363 from endowments and crown grants: and it acquired £11,000 from a bequest by Dr Simpson, of Worcester, in 1840, when its bursaries numbered 128, of the aggregate yearly value of £1643. In 1838, the University Commissioners had recommended that King's College here, and Marischal College in Aberdeen, should be united into one university, to be called the University of Aberdeen, with its seat at Old Aberdeen, and that recommendation was adopted in the Universities Act of 1858, and carried into effect on Sept. 15, 1860. Holding the funds of both colleges, and ranking from the year 1494, the date of King's College, the university has 250 bursaries, of which 223 are attached to the faculty of arts, and 27 to that of theology. They vary from £5 to £50, and average fully £20 apiece, their aggregate value being £5179: there are also eight scholarships of from £70 to £100 per annum. The classes for arts and divinity are now held in King's College, and those for law and medicine in Marischal College. The session, in arts and divinity, extends from the beginning of November to the first Friday of April: in law, from the first Monday of November to the end of March: and in medicine, for winter, from last Wednesday of October to the end of April, for summer, from the first Monday of May to the end of July. The general council meets twice a year- on the Wednesday after the second Tuesday of April, and on the Wednesday after the second Tuesday of October. The chief officers are a chancellor, elected by the general council: a vice-chancellor, appointed by the chancellor: a lord rector, elected by the matriculated students: a principal, appointed by the Crown: and four assessors, chosen by respectively the chancellor, the rector, the general council, and the senatus academicus. The university court consists of the rector, the principal, and the four assessors: and the senatus academicus consists of the principal and the professors. The chairs, with the dates of their establishment and their emoluments, including estimated amounts from fees, are- Greek (1505, £607): humanity (1505, £578): mathematics (1505, £536): natural philosophy (1505, £524): moral philosophy (1505, £492): natural history (1593, £468): logic (1860, £492): divinity and church history (1616, £486): systematic theology (1620, £566): Oriental languages (1674, £439): divinity and biblical criticism (1860, £130): law (1505, £303): chemistry (1505, £531): practice of medicine (1700, £254): anatomy (1839, £600): surgery (1839, £266): medical logic and medical jurisprudence (1857, £222): institutes of medicine (1860, £272): materia mediea (1860, £242): midwifery (1860, £223): and botany (1860, £377). The Crown appoints to 16 of the chairs, the university court to 5, and a composite body of 20 members to the chair of systematic theology. There are also three lectureships-one called the Murray Sunday Lecture (1821), one on practical religion (1825), and one on agriculture (1840): as well as assistantships to the Greek, humanity, mathematics, natural philosophy, chemistry, anatomy, materia medica, and medical logic and jurisprudence chairs, all instituted in 1860. The Act of 1858 awarded compensation, to the aggregate amount of £3500 a-year, to such professors and others as were displaced by new arrangements, authorised the erection of new buildings at King's College, and repairs and alterations in Marischal College, at an estimated cost of respectively £17,936 and £800, and fixed a new scale of emoluments, allotting £599 a-year to the principal, and to professors as given above. The number of members of the general council in 1880 was 2649: of matriculated students in the winter session (1879-80) 701, and in the summer session (1880) 233. The graduates in 1880 were-M.A., 65: M.D., 25: M.B., 51: C.M., 48: D.D., 3: and B.D., 1. The University of Aberdeen unites with that of Glasgow under the Reform Act of 1867, in sending a member to Parliament: they have always returned a Conservative since 1869, the present member in 1880 polling 2520 against his opponent's 2139 votes.

The Grammar School stands E of the Town-House: is a very modest building, with a small playground: has accommodation for 91 scholars: and is chiefly engaged in preparing boys for university bursaries. It dates from time immemorial: but, strictly speaking, is only a sessional school, connected with the kirk-session of Old Machar. The Gymnasium, or Chanonry School, is private property, but has some characteristics of an important public school: was opened in 1848, with design to prepare boys for the university: has accommodation for boarders, 9 class-rooms with capacity for at least 150 boys, and 2 playgrounds: and is conducted by the proprietor, a rector, and 7 masters. There are also a public school and a Bell's school, which, with respective accommodation for 200 and 353 children, had (1879) an average attendance of 235 and 280, and grants of £209, 7s. and £267, 19s. Mitchell's Hospital stands in the south-western vicinity of the cathedral, is a one-story edifice, forming three sides of a square, with garden attached, and was founded in 1801 for lodging, clothing, and maintaining 5 widows and 5 unmarried daughters of burgesses of Old Aberdeen.

The magistrates, from the abolition of Episcopacy till 1723, were appointed by the Crown, and from 1723 till the passing of the Municipal Act, were elected by their own predecessors. The town council consists now of a provost, 4 bailies, 8 merchant councillors, trades councillors, and a treasurer. The magistrates are trustees of £2792 3 per cent. consols as endowment of Dr Bell's school: and some of them share in the management of Mitchell's Hospital. The burgh is ill-defined as to limits, has little property, and no debts. There are 7 incorporated trades, but no guildry. Pop. (1851) 1490, (1861) 1785, (1871) 1857, (1881) 2186.

Colonel Robertson maintains, in his Gaelic Topography (1869), that by old writers New Aberdeen was always discriminated from Old Aberdon; the former he derives from the Gaelic abhir- reidh - an (' smooth river confluence '), the latter from abhir-domhain (' deep confluence '). Such discrimination, however, exists in his imagination only, the name of both kirktown and seaport being written indifferently A berdoen, Aberdon, Aberdin, Aberdene, etc., and in Latin oftenest appearing as Aberdonia; so that one may take it to mean the ford or mouth of either Don or Dee, according as one assigns the priority of foundation to Old or New Aberdeen. And history fails us here, save only that, whilst Old Aberdeen was possibly the seat of a Columban monastery, New Aberdeen is certainly not identical with Devana, a town of the Taexali in the 2d century a.d., Ptolemy placing this fully 30 miles inland, near the Pass of Ballater, and close to Loch Daven. The earliest mention, then, of Aberdeen is also the earliest mention of its see, already referred to on p. 15: next in Snorro's Icelandic Heimskringla, we read, under date 1153, how Eysteinn, a Norwegian kinglet, set forth on a freebooting voyage, and, touching at Orkney, thence spread his sails southwards, and ' steering along the eastern shores of Scotland, brought his ships to the town of Apardion, where he killed many people, and wasted the city. ' Again, the Orkneyinga Saga records how Swein Asleif's son went over to Caithness and up through Scotland, and in Apardion was well entertained for a month by Malcolm IV., ' who then was nine winters old,' which places this visit in 1162. Of authentic charters, the oldest was granted about 1179 by William the Lyon at Perth, and confirmed to his burgesses of Aberdoen the free-trade privilege enjoyed by their forefathers under his grandsire David I. (1124-53): and William here established an exchequer with a mint, and built a palace, which he bestowed in 1211 on monks of the Holy Trinity. Alexander II. kept Yule in Aberdeen (1222), founded its Blackfriars or Dominican priory, and allowed its burgesses to hold a Sunday market: during his reign the town was accidently destroyed by fire (1224). Under Alexander III. (1249-85) the Castle was built, the burgh common seal is mentioned (1271), and we first hear of a provost or alderman (1284). On 14th July 1296, Edward I., in his progress through the realm, came unto Aberdeen, ' a fair castell and a good town vpon the see, and. tarayed there v. days;' a little later Wallace is said by Blind Harry to have burned 100 English vessels in the haven. Bruce, from his rout at Methven (1306), took refuge in Aberdeen: and to this period belongs the legend how the citizens, waxing hot in his cause, rose suddenly by night in a well-planned insurrection, captured the castle, razed it to the ground, and put to the sword its English garrison. ' In honour,' adds Bailie Skene, 'of that resolute act,' they got their Ensignes Armoriall, which to this day they bear-Gules, three Towres triple, towered on a double- Tressure counter flowered Argent, supported by two Leopards propper: the Motto, in an Escroll above, their watchword Bon Accord.' The legend is solely due to Hector Boece's inventive genius, but the garrison was really driven out, and in 1319 King Robert conveyed to the community the royal forest of Stocket and the valuable fishings of the Dee and Don, with various other privileges and immunities, his 'being the Great Charter of the city, from which it dates its political constitution.' In 1333, Edward III. having sent a fleet to night the town of Aberdeen, which they burned and destroyed: in 1336, Edward himself having marched as far north as Inverness, the citizens stoutly encountered at the W end of the Green an English force which had landed at Dunnottar, and slew their leader, Sir Thomas Roslyne. In vengeance whereof Edward, returning, once more burned the town, which, being rebuilt on an extended scale, with material aid from King David Bruce, received the title of ' New Aberdeen.' That monarch resided some time in the city, and erected a mint and held a parliament at it, whilst confirming all his predecessors' grants: Robert III., too, struck coins at Aberdeen. During the captivity of James I. and the minority of James II., the citizens bore arms for their own protection, built walls around the town, kept the gates carefully shut by night, and by day maintained an armed patrol of their own number. In 1411, when the Earl of Mar collected forces to oppose an inroad of Donald of the Isles upon the north-west of the shire, Sir Robert Davidson, Provost of Aberdeen, led a band of the citizens to swell the earl's forces, and fell at their head in the battle of Harlaw. In 1462 the magistrates entered into a ten years' bond with the Earl of Huntly, to protect them in their freedom and property, whilst, saving their allegiance to the Crown, they should at any time receive him and his followers into the city. In 1497 a blockhouse was erected at the entrance of the harbour, as a protection against the English. James IV. paid several visits to Aberdeen: and once, in 1507, he rode in a single day from Stirling, through Perth and Aberdeen, to Elgin. Margaret his queen was sumptuously entertained (1511), as also were James V. (1537) and Mary of Guise (1556). In 1525 the citizens were attacked, and 80 of them killed or wounded by a foraging party under three country lairds: and in consequence the town was put into a better state of defence. The plague raged here in 1401, 1498, 1506, 1514, 1530, 1538, 1546, 1549, 1608, and 1647: and on the last occasion carried off 1760 persons, or more than a fifth of the whole population. In 1547 a body of Aberdonians fought with great gallantry at the disastrous battle of Pinkie: in the early part of 1560 the city firmly received the doctrines of the Reformation, and for ' first minister of the true word of God ' had Adam Heriott, who died in 1574. In 1562, during the conflict between the Earl of Huntly's and Queen Mary's forces, Aberdeen seems to have been awed equally by both parties: but it succumbed to the queen after her victory at Corrichie, and at it she witnessed the execution of Sir John Gordon, Huntly's second son. On 20 Nov. 1571, the Gordons and Forbeses met at the Craibstone between the city and the Bridge of Dee: and in a half-hour's fight the Forbeses were routed, with a loss of 300 men to themselves, of 30 to the Gordons. James VI. paid visits to Aberdeen in 1582, 1589, 1592, 1594, and 1600: on these occasions entailing much expense on the citizens, both in entertainments and in money-gifts. The witch persecution here about this time resulted in the death from torture of many persons in prison, and in the burning, within the two years 1596-97, of 22 women and 1 man on the Castle Hill (Chambers' Dom. Annals, i. 278-285). In 1605 a General Assembly was convened at Aberdeen by Melville and others of the High Presbyterian party, but only 9 attended, who for their pains were 5 of them banished the realm, the others summoned to the English Court: in 1616 another General Assembly resolved that ' a liturgy be made and form of divine service.' A Cavalier stronghold, Aberdeen and the country around it rejected the Covenant, so in 1638 a committee of ministers-Henderson, Dixon, and Andrew Cant-was sent, with the Earl of Montrose at their head, to compel the people to sign. Their mission was thwarted by the famous ' Aberdeen Doctors: ' but Montrose next year twice occupied and taxed the city, on the second occasion winning admittance by the trifling skirmish of the Bridge of Dee, 19 June 1639. In the following May, too, Monro with his thousand deboshed Covenanters, subjected the townsfolk to grievous oppression: and continued harassment had at last subdued them to the Covenanting cause, when, on 13 Sept. 1644, Montrose, as Royalist, re-entered Aberdeen, having routed the Covenanters between the Craibstone and the Justice Mills. ' In the fight,' says Spalding, ' there was little slaughter: but horrible the slaughter in the flight, the lieutenant's men hewing down all they could overtake within and about the town.' So that, as Dr Hill Burton observes, Montrose ' in his two first visits chastised the community into conformity with the Covenant, and now made compensation by chastising them for having yielded to his inflictions.' Charles II. lodged (7 July 1650) in a merchant's house just opposite the Tolbooth, on which was fastened one of Montrose's hands: on 7 Sept. 1651, General Monk led a Commonwealth army into the city, where it continued several years. The Restoration was hailed by the Aberdonians with as great delight as the Revolution was looked on with disfavour: yet scant enthusiasm was roused in Sept. 1715 by the Earl Marischal's proclamation at the Cross of James VIII., who himself on 24 Dec. passed incognito through the city, on his way from Peterhead to Fetteresso, where the Episcopal clergy and the new Jacobite magistrates of Aberdeen offered him homage. In the '45 Cope's force encamped on the site of Union Terrace, and embarked from Aberdeen for Dunbar: the Duke of Gordon's chamberlain again proclaimed James VIII.: Lord Lewis Gordon next occupied the city: and lastly the Duke of Cumberland lodged for 6 weeks in Guestrow. Two or three years before, between 500 and 600 persons of either sex had been kidnapped in Aberdeen for transportation to the American plantations: one of them, Peter Williamson, returning in 1765, and issuing the narrative of his bondage, was imprisoned and banished for defamation of the magistrates, but eventually obtained from them £285 damages (Blackwood's Mag., May 1848). In a riot on the King's birthday (1802) 4 of the populace were shot by the military: 42 of the Oscar's crew were drowned in the Grayhope (1813): and out of 260 persons attackedby cholera (1832) 105 died. The Queen and Prince Albert visited Aberdeen on their way to Balmoral (7 Sept. 1848), and the latter presided at the British Association (14 Sept. 1859): whilst Her Majesty unveiled the Prince Consort Memorial (13 Oct. 1863), and opened the waterworks (16 Oct. 1866), then making her first public speech since her bereavement. Aberdeen has been the meeting-place of the British Association (1859), of the Social Science Congress (1877), and of the Highland and Agricultural Society (1840, '47, '58, '68, and '76).

The 'brave town' gives title of Earl of Aberdeen (cre. 1682) in the peerage of Scotland, of Viscount Gordon of Aberdeen (cre. 1814) in that of the United Kingdom, to a branch of the Gordon family, whose seat is Haddo House. Its illustrious natives are-Jn. Abercrombie, M.D. (1780-1844): Alex. Anderson (flo. 1615), mathe. matician: Prof. Alex. Bain (b. 1818), logician: Jn. Barbour, archdeacon of Aberdeen from 1357 to 1395, and author of the Brus; And. Baxter (1686 1750), metaphysician: Thos. Blackwell (1701-57), scholar: his brother Alexander, the botanist (beheaded at Stockholm, 1747): Alex. Brodie (1830-67), sculptor: Jn. Burnet (1729-84), merchant and benefactor: Jn. Burnett (1764-1810), legal writer: Jn. Hill Burton, LL. D. (1809-81), historian: Geo. Campbell, D.D. (1719-96), divine and grammarian: Alex. Chalmers (1759-1834), biographer and miscellaneous writer: Alex. Cruden (1701. 70), author of the Concordance; Geo. Dalgarno (162687), inventor of a universal language: Jn. Dick, D.D. (1764-1833), Secession divine: Jas. Donaldson, LL.D. (b. 1831), rector of Edinburgh High School: Walter Donaldson, 17th century scholar: Jas. Matthews Duncan, M.D. (b. 1826): Wm. Duncan (1717-60), translator: Wm. Dyce, R. A. (1806-64): Wm. Forbes (15851634), Bishop of Edinburgh: Jn. Forbes Robertson (b. 1822), art-critic: Dav. Fordyce (1711-51), professor of philosophy in Marisehal College: his brothers, James Fordyce, D.D. (1720-96), and Sir Wm. Fordyce (172492), an eminent physician: Jas. Gibbs (1688-1754), architect: Gilbert Gerard (1760-1815), divine: his son, Alexander (d. 1839), explorer: Thos. Gray (d. 1876), artist: Dav. Gregory (1661-1710), geometrician: Jn. Gregory, M.D. (1724-73), and his son, James Gregory, M.D. (1753-1821): Wm. Guild, D.D. (1586-1657), principal of King's College: Gilbert Jack (1578-1628), metaphysician: Alex. Jaffray (1614-73), diarist, provost, and Quaker: George Jameson (1586-1644), the ' Scottish Vandyke: ' Geo. Keith (c. 1650-1715), Quaker and antiQuaker: Sir Jas. M'Grigor, Bart. (1771-1858), head of the army medical department: Prof. Dav. Masson (b. 1822), littérateur: Major Jas. Mercer (1734-1803): Colin Milne, LL.D. (1744-1815), botanist: Rt. Morison, M.D. (1620-83), botanist: Thos. Morison (flo. 1594), physician and anti-papist: Jn. Ogilvie, D.D. (1733-1814), minor poet: Jas. Perry (1756-1821), journalist: Jn. Phillip, R.A. (1817-67): And. Robertson (1777-1865), miniaturist: Rev. Jas. Craigie Robertson (b. 1813), ecclesiastical historian: Jos. Robertson, LL.D. (1810-66), antiquary: Alex. Ross (1590-1654), voluminous writer of Hudibrastic fame: Wm. Skinner, D.D. (1778-1857), Bishop of Aberdeen from 1816: Sir John Steell, R.S.A. (b. 1801), sculptor: Wm. Thom (1799-1848), weaverpoet: and Dav. Wedderburn (c. 1570-1650), Latin poet. -Chief among many illustrious residents are Alexander Arbuthnott (1538-83), principal of King's College from 1569: the wit Jn. Arbuthnot (1667-1735), educated at Marischal Col.: Neil Arnott, M.D. (1788-1874), ed. at Grammar School and Marischal Col.: Wm. Barclay (1546-1605), the learned civilian, student: Peter Bayne (b. 1830), journalist, M.A. of Marischal Col.: the 'Minstrel, ' Jas. Beattie LL.D. (1735-1803), bursar of Marischal Col. 1749, master of Grammar School 1758, and professor of moral philosophy and logic at Marischal Col. 1760: Jn. Stuart Blackie (b. 1809), son of Aberdeen banker, there educated, and professor of Latin literature in Marischal Col. 1841-52: Hector Boece (1465-1536), historian, and first principal of King's Col.: Rt. Brown, D.C.L. (1773-1858), botanist, educated at Marischal Col.: its principal, Wm. Lawrence Brown, D.D. (17551830): Dav. Buchanan (1745-1812), publisher, M.A. of Aberdeen: Gilbert Burnet, D.D. (1643-1715), Bishop of Salisbury, student at Marischal Col. 1653-56: Jas. Burnet, Lord Monboddo (1714-99), student ib.; Chas. Burney (1757-1817), scholar, M.A. of King's Col.: Lord Byron (1788-1824), resident 1790-98: Andrew Cant, minister in Aberdeen in 1640: Donald Cargill (1610-81), Covenanting preacher, student at Aberdeen: Fred. Carmichael (1708-51), divine, student of Marischal Col-: Jas. Cassie, R.S.A. (1819-79): Dav. Chalmers, Lord Ormond (1530-92), student: Geo. Chalmers (17421825), historian, student at King's Col.: Geo. Chapman, LL.D. (1723-1806), bursar ib.; Jas. Cheyne (d. 1602), head of Douay seminary, student: And. Clark (b. 1826), M.D. of Aberdeen in 1854: Pat. Copland, LL.D. (17491822), student and professor of natural philosophy and of mathematics at Marischal Col.: the Banffshire naturalist, Thos. Edward (b. 1814): Rt. Mackenzie Daniel (1814-47), the ' Scottish Boz,' student at Marischal Col.: Thos. Dempster (1579-1625), historian, student: Archibald Forbes (b. 1838), journalist, student: Jn. Forbes (1593-1648), divine, student at King's Col., and minister of St Nicholas: Pat. Forbes (1564-1635), Bishop of Aberdeen from 1618: Wm. Forsyth (d. 1879), poet and journalist: Sir Alexander Fraser (d. 1681), physician to Charles II., student: Simon Fraser, Lord Lovat (1667-1747), student at King's Col.: Al. Gerard, D.D. (1728-95), educated at Grammar School, student at Marischal Col., and professor there of nat. philos. 1752, of divinity 1760, minister of Greyfriars 1759, and prof. of theology at King's Col. 1771: Walter Goodal (170666), antiquary, student at King's Col.: Rt. Gordon (1580-1661), geographer and historian, student at Marischal Col.: Sir Wm. Grant (1754-1822), solicitor-general and master of the rolls, student at King's Col.: Gilbert Gray (d. 1614), second principal of Marischal Col., from 1598: Dav. Gregory (1627-1720), mechanician: his brother, James (1638-75), student at Marischal Col., the famous astronomer: Wm. Guthrie (1701-70), historical and miscellaneous writer, student at King's Col.: Rt. Hall (1764-1831), dissenting divine, student ib.; Rt. Hamilton, LL.D. (1743-1829), prof. at Marischal Col. of nat. phil. 1779, of math. 1780-1814: Jos. Hume (17771855), medical student, and M.P. for Aberdeen 1818: Wm. Hunter (1777-1815), naturalist, student at Marischal Col.: Arthur Johnston (1587-1641), Latin poet, student and rector of King's Col.: Jn. Johnston (15701612), Latin poet, student ib.; Rev. Alex. Keith, D.D. (b. 1791), student at Marischal Col.: Geo. Keith, fifth Earl Marischal (1553-1623), student of King's, and founder of Marischal Col. in 1593: Bishop Rt. Keith (1681-1757), student at Marischal Col.: John Leslie, Bishop of Ross (1526-96), vicar-general of Aberdeen 1558: Jn. Leslie, Bishop of Raphoe (d. 1671), student: David Low, Bishop of Ross (1768-1855), student and LL.D. of Marischal Col.: Geo. Low (1746-95), naturalist, student: Geo. Macdonald (b. 1824), poet and novelist, student at King's Col.: Wm. Macgillivray, LL.D. (d. 1852), prof. of nat. hist. in Marischal Col. from 1841: Sir Geo. Mackenzie (1636-92), legal antiquary, student: Ewen Maclachlan (1775-1822), Gaelic poet, bursar of King's Col., and head-master of Grammar School 1819: Colin Maclaurin (1698-1746), math. prof. in Marischal Col. 1717-25: Jn. Maclean, Bishop of Saskatchewan (b. 1828), student: Jas. Macpherson (1738-96), of Ossian celebrity, student at King's Col. 1752: David Mallet (1700-65), poet, educated at Aberdeen: Jas. Marr (170061), M.A. of King's Col. 1721, master of Poor's Hospital 1742: Jas. Clerk Maxwell (1831-79), prof. of nat. philos. in Marischal Col. 1856-60: Wm. Meston (1688-1745), burlesque poet, student at Marischal Col., and teacher in Grammar School: Jn. Pringle Nichol (1804-59), astronomer, student at King's Col.: Alexander Nicoll (1793-1828), orientalist, educated at Grammar School and Marischal Col.: Sir Jas. Outram (1805-63), Indian general, student at Marischal Col.: Wm. Robinson Pirie, D.D. (b. 1804), divinity professor 1843, principal 1877: Jas. Ramsay (1733-89), philanthropist, bursar of King's Col.: Thos. Reid (1710-96), metaphysician, student and librarian of Marischal Col., prof. of philos. in King's Col. 1752-63: Sir Jn. Rose, Bart. (b. 1820), student at King's Col.: Alex. Ross (1699-1784), poet, M.A. of Marischal Col. 1718: Thos. Ruddiman (16741757), Latin grammarian, bursar of King's Col. 169094: Helenus Scott, M.D. (d. 1821), student: Hy. Scougal (1650-78), prof. of philos. in King's Col. 166973: Jas. Sharpe, Archbishop of St Andrews (1613-79), student at Marischal Col.: Bailie Alex. Skene (flo. 1670), historian of Aberdeen: Rev. Jn. Skinner (1721-1807), poet, bursar of Marischal Col.; his son, Jn. Skinner (1743-1816), student at Marischal Col., and Bishop of Aberdeen from 1784: Jn. Spalding (flo. 1624-45), commissary clerk and diarist: and John Stuart, LL.D. (1813-77), antiquary, student. It may be added that about 1715 Rob Roy was staying with his kinsman, Dr Jas. Gregory, prof. of medicine in King's Col.: that in 1773 Dr Samuel Johnson and Boswell put up at the New Inn: and that Burns came to 'Aberdeen, a lazy town,' 7 Sept. 1787.

The Synod of Aberdeen, generally meeting there, but sometimes at Banff, comprises the presbyteries of Aberdeen, Kincardine O'Neil, Alford, Garioch, Ellon, Deer, Turriff, and Fordyce. Pop. (1871) 285,417, of whom, according to a parliamentary return (1st May 1879) 73,852 were communicants of the Church of Scotland in 1878. The sums raised by its 143 congregations on behalf of Christian liberality amounted to £28,836 in 1880, when there were 210 Sabbath schools within it, with 19,956 scholars. The presbytery of Aberdeen comprises 34 congregations, viz., the 14 Aberdeen churches, and Ruthrieston, Old Machar, University, Woodside, Banchory-Devenick, Craigiebuckler, Belhelvie, Drumoak, Durris, Dyce, Fintray, Kinnellar, Maryculter, Newhills, New Machar, Nigg, Peterculter, Portlethen, Skene, and Stoneywood. Pop. (1871) 111,807, the communicants numbering 22,687 in 1878, and the sums raised for Christian liberality amounting to £13,836 in 1880.-The Free Church synod, whose presbyteries are identical with those of the Established synod, in 1880 had 107 churches, with 28,734 communicants: its presbytery included 37 congregations with 14,378 communicants-the 21 Aberdeen churches, and Banchory, Devenick, Belhelvie, Blackburn, Cults, Drumoak, Durris, Dyce, Kingswell, Maryculter, Newhills, Old Machar, Peterculter, Skene, Torry, Woodside, and Bourtreebush. -The U.P. presbytery of Aberdeen in 1880 had 3283 members and 16 congregations-the 6 Aberdeen churches, and Banehory, Craigdam, Ellon, Lumsden, Lynturk, Midmar, Old Meldrum, Shiels, Stonehaven, and Woodside.-Since 1577 there have been 17 Protestant bishops of Aberdeen, to which the revived diocese of Orkney was added in 1864. In 1880 the congregations of the 37 churches within the united diocese numbered 10,759, the communicants 5316, and the children attending Episcopal schools 2388.-After having been vacant for 301 years, the Catholic see of Aberdeen was re-established in 1878: and in its diocese in 1880 there were 49 priests, 33 missions, 53 churches, chapels, and stations, 2 col leges, 7 convents, and 20 congregational schools.

See, besides works cited under Aberdeenshire, Bailie Alex. Skene's Succinct Survey of the famous City of Aberdeen (1685), W. Thom's History of Aberdeen (2 vols., 1811), Wm. Kennedy's Annals of Aberdeen (2 vols., 1818), Joseph Robertson's Book of Bon-Accord (1839), James Bruce's Lives of Eminent Men of Aberdeen (1841), vol. i. of Billings' Btronial and Ecclesiastical Antiquities (1845), Cosmo Innes' Sketches of Early Scottish History (1861), Aberdeen Fifty Years Ago (1868), Slezer's Theatrum Scotiœ (1693: new ed. 1874), an excellent series of articles in the Builder (1865-66, 1877): and, published by the Spalding Club, the Rev. Jas. Gordon's Description of Bothe Touns of Aberdeen, 1661, ed. by Cosmo Innes (1842), Extracts from the Council Register of the Burgh of Aberdeen, 13981625, ed. by Jn. Stuart (2 vols., 1844-49), his edition of Spalding's Memorialls of the Trubles in Scotland and England, 1624-45 (2 vols., 1850-51), his Selections from the Records of the Kirk-Session, Presbytery, and Synod of Aberdeen, 1562-1681 (1846), and C. Innes' Registrum Episcopatus Aberdonensis (2 vols., 1845), and Selections from the Records of the University and King's College, Aberdeen, 1494-1854 (1854). Besides the Ordnance 6inch and 1/500 maps, there are the Ordnance 1-inch map, sh. 77 (1873), Keith and Gibb's 1¾-inch Map of the Environs (Ab. 1878), and Gibb & Hay's 9-inch Map of the City (Ab. 1880).


(F.H. Groome, Ordnance Gazetteer of Scotland (1882-4); © 2004 Gazetteer for Scotland)

Linked entities:
Feature Description: "the ' Granite City,' capital of Aberdeenshire, seat of a university, and chief town and seaport"   (ADL Feature Type: "capitals")
Administrative units: Aberdeenshire ScoCnty
Place: Aberdeen

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