"Tolbooth" Quotes from Famous Books
 ... single reading one carries that night scene etched for ever in his memory. The sullen, ruthless crowd of dour Scots, the grey rugged houses lit up by the glare of the torches, the irresistible storming of the Tolbooth, the abject helplessness of Porteous in the hands of his enemies, the austere and judicial self-restraint of the people, who did their work as those who were serving justice, their care to provide a minister for the criminal's last ...
— Books and Bookmen • Ian Maclaren
... that the leaders "sought another end than religion." Consequently, when the Lords with their forces arrived at Edinburgh on October 16, the local brethren showed a want of enthusiasm. The Congregation nevertheless summoned the Regent to depart from Leith, and on October 21 met at the Tolbooth to discuss her formal deposition from office. Willock moved that this might lawfully be done. Knox added, with more reserve than usual, that their hearts must not be withdrawn from their King and Queen, Mary and Francis. The Regent, too, ought to be restored when she openly ...
— John Knox and the Reformation • Andrew Lang
... ye suld gang away as a true man, and so ye shall; for auld Caleb can tak the wyte of whatever is taen on for the house, and then it will be a' just ae man's burden; and I will live just as weel in the tolbooth as out of it, and the credit of the family will ...
— Bride of Lammermoor • Sir Walter Scott
... me here is by no means a happy one," replied the lady, in tones that thrilled even the iron nerves of Oliver Cromwell. "I am Lady Rae, General; the wife of John Lord Rae, at present a prisoner in the Tolbooth of Edinburgh for his adherence to the cause of ...
— Wilson's Tales of the Borders and of Scotland, XXII • various
... and the vagabonds with which he is concerned before a barricadoed house, belonging to the Whigs, he can make them get into it by no other method than that which Scott makes his rioters employ to get into the Tolbooth, burning ...
— The Romany Rye - A Sequel to 'Lavengro' • George Borrow
... extreme of St. Stanislas street terminates at the intersection of Ste. Anne street, past the old jail, which dated from 1810. Lugubrious memories crowd round this massive tolbooth—of which the only traces of the past are some vaulted lock-up or cells beneath the rooms of the Literary and Historical Society, one of which, provided with a solid new iron door, is set apart for the reception of the priceless M.S.S. of the society. The oak flooring of the passages to the ...
— Picturesque Quebec • James MacPherson Le Moine
... having originally figured in other situations, to which they were calculated by their sculptures and inscriptions, have a very curious effect. Among the various relics which Sir Walter has contrived to collect, may be mentioned the door of the old Tolbooth of Edinburgh, which, together with the hewn stones that composed the gateway, are now made to figure in a base court at the west end ...
— The Mirror of Literature, Amusement, and Instruction, No. 571 - Volume 20, No. 571—Supplementary Number • Various
... sure enough! All to hear was the spilling of the river at the cascade under the bridge and the plopping of the waves against the wall we call the ramparts, that keeps the sea from thrashing on the Tolbooth. And then over all I could hear a most strange moaning sound, such as we boys used to make with a piece of lath nicked at the edges and swung hurriedly round the head by a string. It was made by the wind, I knew, for it came loudest in the gusty bits of the night and from the ...
— John Splendid - The Tale of a Poor Gentleman, and the Little Wars of Lorn • Neil Munro
... his worst enemies have never tried to fasten on him. To be doing something was, indeed, a necessity of his existence; and his duties as Constable soon furnished him with something to do. In the Tolbooth of Dundee lay a number of poor wretches whom the hard laws of the time had sentenced to death for various offences, the gravest of which did not rise above theft. It was within the Constable's power to order them at any moment for execution; and doubtless some of those ...
— Claverhouse • Mowbray Morris |
