It's not paupers or robbers, but RIOTERS who either raged, or more likely, RANGED (meaning wandered over a large area) around St. Giles.

It was at St. Giles cathedral in Edinburgh that a reading from the new Episcopalian book of prayer triggered a riot. Specifically, it was Jenny Geddes throwing a stool at the head of the Dean of Edinburgh, John Hannah, that began the riot, and, in some sense, led to the whole of the English Civil War.

These lyrics are a hoot. Some of the best misheard lines on the 'net. My personal fav is from "Hotel California" : "...she got a Mercedes bends" like she drove it off a bridge into deep water and came up too fast or something, but "a new fair buck or "showed James the road somehow" are tied for second place.