THE unpretending structure which forms the subject of the illustration is thus grandiloquently spoken of by McUre, writing in 1736 :- "As you walk westward from the Great Bridge towards the stately harbour of the city, stands the most celebrated Hospital built by the city of Glasgow, for alimenting and educating upwards of one hundred and fifty-two poor decayed old men, widows, and orphans of this city. The building is of modern fashion, and exceeds any of that kind in Europe, and admired by strangers, who affirms that Sutton's Hospital, called the Charter House, at London, which indeed is a noble foundation: but the house, neither of that nor Christ's Church, or anything of that kind at Rome or Venice comes not up to the magnificence of this building, when it is finished, resembling more like a palace than a habitation for necessitous old people and children. I confess Heriot's Hospital at Edinburgh is more embellished over the windows thereof. Our hospital is likewise accommodated with a fine well and stately garden, fenced round with a curious wall of ashler work, together with a handsome chapel and hall for the poor people and boys to eat in."

Soberly speaking, the old Town's Hospital was founded in the locality now called Clyde Street, in 1730, and opened for the reception of the poor on 15th November, 1733. It originally consisted of a front and wings, but subsequently a large detached building was erected in the vacant court or garden behind, which subserved the purpose of a Lunatic Asylum and an Infirmary. The total cost seems from the books to have been £1,897 6s., of which £1.500 were raised by subscription from the Town Council, General Session, Merchants' House, and Trades' House, and the balance by assessment. It would appear that the paupers were indisposed to become inmates of the house - an institution which was comparatively new in Scotland in these days, and associated in the minds of the poor with mysterious restrictions and privations; and accordingly the directors had to encourage them by a declaration to the effect that they will "enjoy a desirable measure of liberty, good company, convenience for retirement, peace and quiet, freedom from all hurtful toil and care, with good provisions, liberty to go to church on Sabbath, and to week-day sermons, and to see their friends, with abundant means of instruction and edification." This announcement seems to have had the desired effect, for at the close of the first year the inmates amounted to 151, of whom 61 were old persons and 90 were children. The demands ever after pressed hard upon the means of receiving and maintaining them; and, for a long period previous to the disuse of the building, these were felt to be quite inadequate, and the house was entirely appropriated to the alimenting of old people, the children being boarded out, as they still are, with poor families in the city and surrounding villages. The building would not come up to the sanitary standard of an hospital now-a-days, with its small rooms and low ceilings, narrow passages, and imperfect ventilation; but it will always be regarded in Glasgow with reverence and respect as having afforded a shelter and solace to the declining years of thousands of poor, and many of them deserving people, who had seen better days, and in the hey-day of life occupied a prominent and respectable position amongst the community. In 1844 the building was entirely discontinued as a poor's-house, the paupers having been then transferred to the spacious structure in Parliamentary Road, which up till that period had been used as the Glasgow Lunatic Asylum. In 1848-49 the Hospital was again opened in connection with the City parish, but on this occasion for the reception of patients stricken with cholera, during the lamentable visitation of the pestilence at that period. At the present period (1851), the "stately" Town's Hospital has lost all traces of its original benevolent and charitable character - one portion being occupied as a second-hand furniture warehouse, a second as a whisky cellar, a third as a provision store, and a fourth as a receptacle for the accumulation of woollen and cotton rags, ropes, old and metals.

It may be interesting to state that the revenue for the Hospital during the first year of its existence amounted to only £570, of which only £250 were raised by assessment, the larger portion being contributed by the public bodies already named. The sum, moderate as it is for the maintenance of more than 150 people, was more than sufficient, as may be seen from the balance sheet of the day. This tidy little balance sheet contrasts most painfully with the state of matters in the present day, when for the last few years the charges for pauperism in the City parish have varied £45,000 to £75,000 per annum; and this quite irrespective of the large sums raised for a similar purpose in the parishes of Barony, Gorbals, and Govan, which all form part and parcel of the municipality of Glasgow - an increase, however, attributable to the proximity of Ireland, and the facilities which steamers afford to an unwelcome immigration. The building and grounds now belong to the Caledonian Railway Company, by whom they were purchased in connection with the proposed bridge over the Clyde at this point, a project not likely to be realized, however, in the present generation.