Top of the close

Top of the close 1/100, f/1.8, ISO400

At the top of Fleshmarket Close, there’s a bit more sky to light the scene – but a well placed street light helps provide some focus.

The Wren

Why is the cuckoo’s melody preferred

And nightingale’s rich song so fondly praised

In poet’s rhymes? Is there no other bird

Of nature’s minstrelsy that oft hath raised

One’s heart to ecstacy and mirth as well?

 

John Clare

Silent Tunnel

Are you bowed down in heart?
Do you but hear the clashing discords and the din of life?
Then come away, come to the peaceful wood,
Here bathe your soul in silence.

Deep in the Quiet Wood  James Weldon Johnson

Nineteen

Warriston Cemetry has a number of Commonwealth War Graves that have been cleared of the surrounding undergrowth.

Archibald Douglas McLaggan was only 19 years old when he died in 1916. His parents lived at Raeburn Place, Edinburgh.

Simpson

Another from Warriston Cemetry. This family name is well known and lives on with generations of Edinburgers. Sir James Young Simpson (1811 – 1870), or at least his surname, is best known for it’s association with Edinburgh’s principal maternity hospital. This tulip, I think – I’m not very good with flowers, almost radiated light from it’s centre, and sat within the monument that marks Simpson’s grave.

                       1/250, f/11, ISO160.

Simpson was a pioneer in the use of choloform in obstetric anaesthesia and at a time before the NHS would provide support to the poor. However even as a well to do Baronet and Obstetrician his family were not immune to the harshness of the age. The grave shows three of his children dying at ages 2, 3 and 15 years.

When Simpson died, it is reported that two thousand mourners followed the cortege, and 50,000 people lined the streets of Edinburgh.

Adam Black

These old cemetries are the resting palce for the entire social spectrum from a traceless mother with no name and a simple stone, through to this family, whose legacy appears in substantial stonework, the public record and in the history books. In this case, quite literally in ‘history’ books.

1/200, f/5.0, ISO160

Adam Black created a publishing firm A&C Black (now part of Bloomsbury), that in his lifetime published three editions of the Encyclopedia Britannica and Sir Walter Scott’s Waverley Novels. He was a fellow of the Royal Society of Edinburgh, twice served as Lord Provost of the city and was it’s MP for nine years. It’s little wonder his grave is marked with somewhat more panache than the unknown mother. But his legacy is perhaps not the most significant of Warriston’s residents. More about who that is in a couple of days.

 

Grey tower

The final photo from a walk round the Gyle busines park. I don’t know which building this is. Edinburgh is not a city of tall buildings, so you need to get close to the ground to get any sense of presence from the buildings. I think the guests of the local budget hotel thought I was mad, lying on the ground taking the picture of an office stairwell!

1/100, f/10, ISO160

More abstract architecture

It was nice on Sunday, wondering around a deserted business park. I was on the lookout for interesting images using abstracts from the typical business park architecture.1/160, f/10, ISO160

 

Windows

More architecture………1/200, f/10, ISO160

Blue Sky

Time for a minimalist architecture shot.
1/160, f/10, ISO160