Sometimes the rod was simply stretched across the
VIZZYING hole, a convenient aperture through which the porter
could take cognisance of the person applying; in which case it
acted also as a stanchion. These were almost all disused about
sixty years ago, when knockers were generally substituted as more
genteel. But knockers at that time did not long remain in
repute, though they have never been altogether superseded, even
by bells, in the Old Town. The comparative merit of knockers and
pins was for a long time a subject of doubt, and many knockers
got their heads twisted off in the course of the dispute."--
CHAMBERS'S TRADITIONS OF EDINBURGH.
Note 4.--COUNTESS OF EGLINTON.
Susannah Kennedy, daughter of Sir Archibald Kennedy of Cullean,
Bart., by Elizabeth Lesly, daughter of David Lord Newark, third
wife of Alexander 9th Earl of Eglinton, and mother of the 10th
and 11th Earls. She survived her husband, who died 1729, no less
than fifty-seven years, and died March 1780, in her ninety-first
year. Allan Ramsay's Gentle Shepherd, published 1726, is
dedicated to her, in verse, by Hamilton of Bangour.
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