Some of the exiles went as far north as Scotland, and settled there. Thus, a colony of weavers from Picardy, in France, began the manufacture of linen in a suburb of Edinburgh near the head of Leith Walk, long after known as "Little Picardy," the name still surviving in Picardy Place.* Others of them built a silk-factory, and laid out a mulberry plantation on the slope of Moultrie Hill, then an open common. The refugees were sufficiently numerous in Edinburgh to form a church, of which the Rev. Mr. Dupont was minister; and William III., in 1693, granted to the city a duty of two pennies on each pint of ale, out of which 2000 merks were to be paid yearly towards the maintenance of the ministers of the French congregation. At Glasgow, one of the refugees succeeded in establishing a paper-mill, the first in that part of Scotland. The Huguenot who erected it escaped from France accompanied only by his little daughter. For some time after his arrival in Glasgow, he maintained himself by picking up rags in the streets. But, by dint of thrift and diligence, he eventually contrived to

they are wonderfully exercised and improved within these few years past," most probably in consequence of the arrival of the French settlers after the Revocation of the Edict of Nantes. MRS. PALLISER-History of Lace, p. 353.

It has been surmised that Burdie House-a corruption of Bordeaux House, near Edinburgh, was so called because inhabited by another body of

French refugees at the same period. But this is a mistake; the place having been so called by the Frenchman who built the original housemost probably one of the followers of Mary Stuart, on her coming over to Scotland to take possession of the Scottish throne. The village of "Little France," near Craigmillar Castle, the residence of Queen Mary, was so called from being the quarters of her French guards.

accumulate means sufficient to enable him to start his paper-mill, and thus to lay the foundation of an important branch of Scottish industry.

In short, there was scarcely a branch of trade in Great Britain but at once felt the beneficial effects of the large influx of experienced workmen from France. Besides improving those manufactures which had already been established, they introduced many entirely new branches of industry; and by their skill, their intelligence, and their laboriousness, they richly repaid England for the hospitality and the asylum which had been so generously extended to them in their time of need.

CHAPTER XV.

THE HUGUENOT CHURCHES IN ENGLAND.

THE vast number of French Protestants who fled into England on the Revocation of the Edict of Nantes led to a large increase in the number of French churches. This was especially the case in London, which was the principal seat of the immigration. It may serve to give the reader an idea of the large admixture of Huguenot blood in the London population, when we state that about the beginning of last century, at which time the population of the metropolis was not one-fourth of what it is now, there were no fewer than thirty-five French churches in London and the suburbs.* Of these, eleven were in Spitalfields, showing the preponderance of the French settlers in that quarter.

The French church in Threadneedle Street, the oldest in London, was in a manner the cathedral church of the Huguenots. Thither the refugees usually repaired on their arrival in London, and such of them as had temporarily abjured their faith before flying, to avoid the penalty of death or condemnation to the galleys, made acknowledgment of their repentance,

* Mr. Burn, in his History of the Foreign Protestant Refugees, gives the names of nearly forty French churches

in London; but several of these were old churches merely translated or rebuilt with new names.

and were again received into membership. During the years immediately following the Revocation, the consistory of the French church met at least once in every week in Threadneedle Street chapel for the purpose of receiving such acknowledgments or "reconnaissances." The ministers heard the narrative of the trials of the refugees, examined their testimony, and, when judged worthy, received them into communion. At the sitting of the 5th of March 1686, fifty fugitives from various provinces of France abjured the Roman Catholic religion, to which they had pretended to be converted; and at one of the sittings in May 1687, not fewer than 497 members were again received into the church which they had pretended to abandon.*

While the church in Threadneedle Street was thus resorted to by the Huguenot Calvinists, the French Episcopal church in the Savoy, opened about the year 1641, was similarly resorted to by the foreign Protestants of the Lutheran persuasion. This was the fashionable French church of the West End, and was resorted to by many of the nobility, who were attracted by the eloquence of the preachers who usually ministered there; amongst whom we recognise the great

* We find the following entry relat ing to the same subject in the Register of Glass House Street Chapel :—“ Le Dimanche, 13 May 1688, Elizabeth Cautin de St. Martin de Retz, Susanne Cellier et Marie Cellier sa Souer de la Rochelle ont fait recognoissance publique au presche du Matin, l'une pour avoir esté au Sermon feignant

d'estre de l'Eglise Romaine, les autres deux por avoir signé leur Abjuration. Mon. Coutet les a receues."

+ Evelyn mentions his attending it in 1649, the following entry appearing in his journal of that year :-"In the afternoon I went to the French church in the Savoy, where I heard M. d'Espagne catechise."

names of Durrel, Severin, Abbadie, Saurin, Dubourdieu, Majendie, and Durand. There were also the following French churches in the western parts of London:-the chapel of Marylebone, founded about the year 1656; the chapel in Somerset House, originally granted by Charles I. to his queen Henrietta as a Roman Catholic place of worship, but which was afterwards appropriated by Parliament, in 1653, for the use of the French Protestants; Castle Street Chapel in Leicester Square, erected at the expense of the government in 1672 as a place of worship for the refugees ; the Little Savoy Chapel in the Strand, granted for the same purpose in 1675; and Hungerford Chapel in Hungerford Market, which was opened as a French church in 1687.

After the Revolution of 1688, a considerable addition was made to the French churches at the West End. Thus, three new congregations were formed in the year 1689,-those of La Patente, in Soho, first opened in Berwick Street, from whence it was afterwards removed to Little Chapel Street, Wardour Street; Glasshouse Street Chapel, Golden Square, from whence it was afterwards removed to Leicester Fields; and La Quarré (episcopal) Chapel, originally of Berwick Street, and afterwards of Little Dean Street, Westminster.

Another important French church at the West End was that of Swallow Street, Piccadilly.* This con

The chapel was sold to Dr. James Anderson in 1710, and is now used as a Scotch church.