with enriched mouldings, having a crocketed hood terminating in an enriched finial. At either side are two small buttresses, each containing [Illustration: FIG. 919.--St. Bridget’s or St. Bride’s Church. Monument of James, Seventh Earl of Douglas.] a small statue and covered with a crocketed pinnacle. A parapet, pierced with quatrefoils, and which has been considerably renewed, runs along the top. On the wall at the back of the arched recess a figure, kneeling at an altar, is carved. A small shield over the altar bears the Douglas arms, and the scroll carried an inscription, now obliterated. In Blore’s time this monument was sadly destroyed, and the small figures were scattered over the floor, but they have now been replaced and the monument restored. The base of the monument bears an ornament of sculptured foliage, very closely resembling that on the two eastern pillars of St. Giles’, Edinburgh, the work on both being probably of about the same period, about the middle of the fifteenth century. [Illustration: FIG. 920.--St. Bridget’s or St. Bride’s Church. Effigies of James, Seventh Earl of Douglas, and Beatrice de Sinclair.] In the south wall of the choir there is a third monument (Fig. 919), which contains recumbent figures of James, seventh Earl of Douglas, and Beatrice de Sinclair, his wife (Fig. 920). The former is in armour, but the statue is much broken. The latter wears a long robe. The heads rest on cushions, and the hands are clasped in the attitude of prayer. In the face of the tomb are ten niches containing upright figures of the sons and daughters of the Earl and Countess, and one niche containing an angel, who supports a shield blazoned with the Douglas and Sinclair arms. Above the figures was the following inscription:--“Hic jacet magnus et potens princeps Dominus Jacobus de Douglas Dux Toureniae et Comes de Douglas Dominus Annandiae Gallovidiae Liddaliae Jedburg Forestiae et Dominus de Balveniae Magnus Wardanus Regni Scotiae versus Angliam, &c., qui obiit 24 die mensis Martii anno domini 1443.”[184] [Illustration: FIG. 921.--St. Bridget’s or St. Bride’s Church. Crocket and Finial of Monument.] This Earl was the brother of the forementioned Archibald, sixth Earl, to whom he succeeded after the murder, in Edinburgh Castle, of Archibald’s two sons. He was called “Le Gros” on account of his corpulence, and seems to have been a “prudent and peaceable man.” The inscription for his lady was as follows:--“Hic jacit Domina Beatrix de Sinclair filia domini Henrici Comitis Arcadum Domini de Sinclair, &c. Comitessa de Douglas et Aveniae Domina Gallovidiae.” On the east side of these inscriptions was a stone, on which were recorded the names and titles of the sons and daughters. “This inscription enables us to fix the date of the erection of the monument--viz., between 1448, when Archibald was made Earl of Moray, and 1451, when James, the eldest son, was killed.”[185]