Chap. VIII.

BRITAIN .

S39

year 1485 a law was passed, prohibiting the inhabitants of Leith from engaging in anycommercial intercourse with the people of Edinburgh , and also forbidding the latter toadmit the former into partnership, on pain of forfeiting the privileges of the city, so greatwas the jealousy between the two rivals for commercial advantages; and it was not till the

Fig. 334.

LEITH HARBOUR.

citizens of Edinburgh purchased the surrounding land of the feudal lord that any thinglike unity or harmony was established, and their common interests found to be identical.

Dundee Harbour is entirely formed by art, and by considerable difficulty it has been madeto answer the purpose of sheltering vessels, and render them safe and quiet; but the

ELEVATION or rcrut PIER .N.JIOE

Fig. 335. DUNDEE HARBOUR.

I1CTIOB

means adopted to make the entrance convenient and easy of access has rendered it moreliable to the deposit of mud and sand; the method formerly employed to cleanse theharbour from the silt was by allowing a quantity of water to pass through sluices fromthe basin, and at the same time causing a number of men to throw into the current the