present day. The revolutionary riots of 1848-49 and the Prussian occupation in 1866-67 were merely passing shadows. In 1879 Leipsic acquired a new importance by becoming the seat of the supreme courts of the German empire.
The immediate neighbourhood of Leipsic has been the scene of numerous battles, two of which are of more than ordinary importance, viz., the battle of Breitenfeld in 1631 (vol. xi. p. 334), and the great battle of Leipsic, known in Germany as the Völkerschlacht, fought in 1813 between Napoleon and the allied forces of Russia, Germany, and Austria.
Towards the middle of last century Leipsic was the seat of the most influential body of literary men in Germany, over whom Gottsched (q.v.), like his contemporary Samuel Johnson in England, exercised a kind of literary dictatorship. Then, if ever, Leipsic deserved the epithet of a “Paris in miniature” (Klein-Paris), assigned to it by Goethe in his Faust. The young Lessing produced his first play in the Leipsic theatre, and the university counts Goethe, Klopstock, Jean Paul Richter, the Schlegels, Fichte, Schelling, and numerous other eminent writers and thinkers among its quondam alumni. Schiller also resided for a time in Leipsic, and Sebastian Bach, Hiller, and Mendelssohn all filled musical posts there. Among the famous natives of the town are the philosopher Leibnitz and the composer Wagner.
See the Urkundenbuch der Stadt Leipzig, 1870 sq.; Grosse, Geschichte der Stadt Leipzig, 1837-42; Sparfeld, Chronik der Stadt Leipzig, 2d ed., 1851; Gretschel, Die Universität Leipzig, 1830; Moser, Leipzig's Handel und Messen, 1869; Hasse, Die Stadt Leipzig und ihre Umgebung geographisch und statistisch beschrieben, 1878; the Mittheilungen of the Statistical Bureau of Leipsic; and the Schriften of the Leipsic Historical Society. (J. F. M.)
LEITH, a municipal and parliamentary burgh of Midlothian, the chief seaport of the east coast of Scotland, 1¾ miles north by east of Edinburgh, with which it is connected by Leith Walk and other lines of street. It is built on the southern shore of the Firth of Forth, at the mouth of the Water of Leith, which, crossed by seven bridges, divides it into North and South Leith. Stretching along the coast for about 3¼ miles from Seafield on the east to Granton on the west, the burgh includes the fishing village of Newhaven, the suburb of Trinity, and part of Wardie, and extends to an area of 1978 acres. It figures as Inverleith (“mouth of the Leith”) in the foundation charter of Holyrood Abbey (1128); and many of its houses, in narrow wynds and along the eastern waterside, have an antique and decayed appearance. The earliest date on any is 1573; but one, at the Coalhill, is thought to be the “handsome and spacious edifice” built for her privy council by the queen regent, Mary of Guise. Nothing remains of D'Essé's fortifications (1549) or of Cromwell's “fair citadel” (1650); but it was Cromwell's troops that raised the battery mounds upon the Links, a grassy expanse of 1140 by 400 yards, bought for a public park in 1857. Leith Fort, the headquarters of the royal artillery in Scotland, dates from 1779; the quaint old Tolbooth, where Maitland of Lethington poisoned himself (1573), was demolished in 1819; and the public buildings one and all are modern, most of them classical structures. They comprise the town-hall (1828), the custom-house (1812), Trinity house (1817), with David Scott's Vasco de Gama and other paintings, the exchange buildings, the corn exchange (1862), the markets (1818), the slaughter-house (1862), the post-office (1876), the public institute (1867), the poor-house (1862), the hospital (1872-76), John Watt s hospital (1862), the high school (1806), and Dr Bell s school (1839). In December 1881 eight board schools had 4839 children on the roll, and an average attendance of 3932.
Plan of Leith.
Of twenty-seven churches, belonging to nine different denominations, the only ancient one is that of South Leith parish, which, founded in 1483, and dedicated to St Mary, was originally cruciform, but now, as “restored” in 1852, consists of merely an aisled nave and square north-western tower; David Lindsay preached in it before James VI. a thanksgiving sermon on the Gowrie conspiracy (1600), and in its graveyard lies the Eev. John Home (1722-1808), author of Douglas, and a native of Leith. Other places of worship are North Leith parish church (1814-16), with Grecian spire of 158 feet; North Leith Free church (1859), in Germanized Gothic, with spire of 160 feet; and St James's Episcopal church (1862-69), a cruciform structure, designed in Early English style by the late Sir G. G. Scott, with apsidal chancel, a spire of 160 feet, and a peal of bells.
So early as 1313 Leith possessed its ships, they in that year being burnt by the English. But in a wide flat foreshore and drifting sands the port has had great difficulties to contend with; and Tucker in 1656 describes it merely as “a convenient dry harbour into which the firth ebbs and flows every tide, with a convenient quay on the one side thereof, of a good length for lading of goods.” The earliest dock was commenced in 1720, and the custom house quay constructed in 1777; but little of the existing works is older than the present century. These, with date, cost, and area, comprise the Old docks (1801-17; £285,108; 10½ acres), the Victoria dock (1852; £135,000; 5 acres), the Albert dock (1863-69; £224,500; 10¾ acres), and the Edinburgh dock (1874-81; £400,000; 16⅔ acres); in connexion with the last two 62 and 108 acres were reclaimed from the east sands. The largest of seven graving docks, the Prince of Wales dock (1858), measures 370 by 60 feet, and cost £100,000; the east and wesb piers, extended or formed during 1826-52, and respectively 3530 and 3123 feet long, leave an entrance to the harbour 250 feet broad, with a depth at high water of 20 to 25 feet. The aggregate tonnage registered as belonging to the port was 1702 in 1692, 6935 in 1752, 25,427 in 1844, 28,303 (3946 steam) in 1854, 33,303 in 1860, 44,892 in 1867, 65,692 in 1873, 74,713 in 1878, and 86,509 on 31st December 1881, viz., 64 sailing vessels of 16,371 tons, and 125 steam-vessels of 70,138 tons, the largest of the latter being one of 2144 tons. This shows marked progress, as likewise does the following table, giving the aggregate tonnage of British and foreign vessels that entered and cleared from and to foreign ports and coast-
