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'Auld Reekie' got its name from the thick palls of smoke that used to hang around old Edinburgh, and the smell. The overcrowding was tremendous, with wooden tenements 11 stories high bulging at the seams, and many people living beneath the ground. The poverty and squalor would be unimaginable today. Sanitation was non-existent, with waste thrown from windows with the warning "Gardyloo" (from the French "Gardez! L'eau!") while the people below shouted back "haud yer haund!" to buy themselves a bit of time!

The railway station stands on the site of Nor' Loch. This was full of sewage! It was drained in the mid-to-late 18th century.