Kirkcudbright

“ The shire returns one member to parliament, and the county town (Kirkcudbright) belongs to the Dumfries district group of parliamentary burghs, and Maxwelltown is combined with Dumfries. The county forms part of the sheriffdom of Dumfries and Galloway, and there is a resident sheriff-substitute at Kirkcudbright. The county is under school-board jurisdiction. There is an academy at Kirkcudbright, high schools at Dumfries and Newton Stewart, and technical classes at Kirkcudbright, Dalbeattie, Castle Douglas and Dumfries. ”

“ It was but a scouting party, for in a moment we heard the trumpet blow from the main body, which had kept the road that winds down to the old ford, over the Black Water on the way from Kirkcudbright to New Galloway and Kenmuir.
In a little the sounds came fainter on our ears, and the swing and trample of the hoofs grew so far away that we could not hear them any more.
But the great cloud of people stood for long time still, no man daring to move. ”

“ KIRKCUDBRIGHTSHIRE (also known as the Stewartry of Kirkcudbright and East Galloway) , a south-western county of Scotland, bounded N. and N.W. by Ayrshire, W. and S.W. by Wigtownshire, S. and S.E. by the Irish Sea and Solway Firth, and E. and N.E. by Dumfriesshire. It includes the small islands of Hestan and Little Ross, which are utilized as lighthouse stations. It has an area of 575,565 acres or 899 sq. m. The north-western part of the shire is rugged, wild and desolate. ”

“ The crew was three-fourths made of Kirkcudbright men who had known the master from childhood, many of them, indeed, being older than he; they were mostly jealous of Paul, envious of the command he had attained to over them, and impatient under the discipline he was ever ready to inflict. 'Tis no light task to enforce obedience from those with whom one has birdnested. ”

“ Time and time we met people plodding along, some of them nodding uncertainly, others abruptly taking the far side of the pike, and every encounter drove the poison deeper into his soul. But after we had travelled some way, up hill and down dale, he vouchsafed the intelligence that we were making for Arbigland, Mr. Craik's seat near Dumfries, which lies on the Nith twenty miles or so up the Solway from Kirkcudbright. On that estate stood the cottage where John Paul was born, and where his mother and sisters still dwelt. ”

“ The revenue officers were intimidated, and relinquished their prize, though defended only by the courage and address of one man. On his proper element, Yawkins was equally successful. On one occasion he was landing his cargo at the Manxman’s Lake, near Kirkcudbright, when two revenue cutters, the Pigmy and the Dwarf, hove in sight at once, on different tacks, the one coming round by the Isles of Fleet, the other between the point of Rueberry and the Muckle Ron. ”

“ They came upon him and left him lying on the snow.—Ah, go, dear cousin William!" she said, breaking into a sharp cry of entreaty lest I should fail her. "It is you that can save him. But let him not see you follow, or it will make him more bitter against me. For if you cannot play with the sword, you can shoot with the pistol; so I have heard, and they tell me that no one can shoot so truly as thou. They would not let thee shoot at Kirkcudbright for the Siller Gun though thou art a burgess, because it were no fair game. ”

“ The next year he went on a mission to the Picts of Galloway, who were then in a wild and uncivilised condition, constantly fighting among themselves, and sunk in vice and ignorance. He was at Kirkcudbright on 20 March. ”

“ And it was I, the passenger, who sailed her into Kirkcudbright, tho' I had never been more than a chief mate before. That is scarce three years gone, when I was just turned one and twenty. And old Mr. Currie, who had known my father, was so pleased that he gave me the ship. I had been chief mate of the 'Two Friends', a slaver out of Kingston."
"And so you were in that trade!" I exclaimed.
He seemed to hesitate.
"Yes," he replied, "and sorry I am to say it. But a man must live. It was no place for a gentleman, and I left of my own accord. Before that, I was on a slaver out of Whitehaven." ”

“ We fought for ‘Christ’s Crown and Covenant,’ and they have sent us a banner with the device—‘Queen Anne’s Crown and the Test!’”
But I think that the women were even more warmly on our side, for the canker of persecution had eaten deeper into their hearts, that had only waited and mourned while their men folk were out suffering and fighting.
“Be ye none feared, laddie,” said Millicent Hannay, an ancient dame who had stood the thumbikins thrice in the gaol of Kirkcudbright; “the most part of the ministers may stick like burrs to their manses and glebes, their tiends and tithings. ”

“ Nevertheless he continued for some time to preach privately in the counties of Down, Tyrone, and Donegal until 1638, when on receiving a call from the congregation of his native town, Kirkcudbright, he returned to Scotland. He was a member of the general assembly of that year; and in reference to a desire of the king that certain assessors named by himself should have a vote, he in a sermon shortly afterwards 'stated that the king had no more to do with their general assemblies then they had to do with his parliament' (ib. i. 145) . ”

“ There's a grand Venetian fête on, and old George will be there."
"Right," says Tunbridge Wells.
When they get to the gardens his friend takes him aside.
"I say," he begins anxiously, "I hope you won't mind, but the fact is that I've promised you shall dance in a minuet to-night. Old George particularly wants to see one."
"But I simply couldn't," says Tunbridge Wells, in alarm. "Can't you get somebody else?"
"Oh, but you must. I've got you a jolly partner—the Duchess of Kirkcudbright (N.B.) . You know the minuet, of course?" ”

“ Welch had either reproved him, or merely from hatred, Mr. Welch was most unworthily abused by the unhappy man, amongst the rest of the injuries he did him, this was one, Mr. Welch kept always two good horses for his use, and the wicked gentleman when he could do no more, either with his own hand, or his servants, cut off the rumps of the two innocent beasts, upon which followed such effusion of blood, that they both died, which Mr. Welch did much resent, and such base usage as this persuaded him to listen to a call to the ministry at Kirkcudbright, which was his next post. ”

“ Peter Kirkstone, her brother, is a murderer, a cold-blooded murderer. And only Miriam Kirkstone and your humble servant, Prince Kao, know his secret. And to buy my secret, to save his life, the golden-headed goddess is almost ready to give herself to me—almost, John Keith. She will decide tonight, when you go to her. She will come. Yes, she will come tonight. I do not fear. I have prepared for her the candles, the bridal dais, the nuptial supper. Oh, she will come. For if she does not, if she fails, with tomorrow's dawn Peter Kirkstone and John Keith both go to the hangman! ”

“ After the murder of Murray Kirkcaldy ranged himself definitely among the friends of the imprisoned queen. About this time he forcibly released one of his supporters from imprisonment, a step which led to an altercation with his former friend John Knox, who called him a “murderer and throat-cutter.” Defying the regent Lennox, Kirkcaldy began to strengthen the fortifications of Edinburgh castle, of which he was governor, and which he held for Mary, and early in 1573 he refused to come to an agreement with the regent Morton because the terms of peace did not include a section of his friends. ”

“ Once again Sir James Kirkcaldy figures in connection with the sovereign whom his advice, had it not been so petulantly neglected, might have saved from the closing disaster of his career. After the ill-fated battle of Solway Moss, when King James wandered aimlessly and hopelessly into Fifeshire, ashamed to look any man in the face, it was to Halyards, one of the Laird of Grange’s estates, that he came for rest and shelter. ”

“ But it might be he should requite him in full, either in Scotland or in France.’
The French soon learnt to their cost that Kirkcaldy had not been indulging in mere braggart threats. At the head of a thousand horse, and accompanied by the Master of Sinclair, he lay in wait for them day and night, and made it unsafe for them to venture out of Kinghorn except in large bodies. One of his exploits was the capture of three ships, laden with victuals, and the slaughter of some sixty Frenchmen that were on board. ”

“ The day that the new Regent was elected, there occurred another important event, which was destined to exercise great influence on Kirkcaldy’s fate. On that same 24th of November, John Knox died in Edinburgh, to which he had returned shortly before in a sinking condition. As he lay on his death-bed he desired his friend, David Lindsay, the minister of Leith, to take a message from him to the Laird of Grange. “‘Go, I pray you,’ he said, ‘and tell him that I have sent you to him yet once to warn him; and bid him, in the name of God, leave [142] that evil cause, and give over that Castle. ”

“ IX. LANGSIDE—AND AFTER Whilst Sir William Kirkcaldy was cruising in the North, important events were taking place in the Capital. The enforced abdication of Queen Mary had been followed by the appointment of her half-brother, the Lord James, Earl of Murray, to be Regent of the Realm. One of his first acts was to obtain the surrender of Edinburgh Castle from Sir James Balfour, who had been made Governor of it by the interest of Bothwell. That had not prevented him, however, from siding with the Lords when he saw the success of their arms. ”

“ Respectfully, yet firmly, addressing his sovereign, he begged to be told what offence he had committed, and why he had suddenly been deprived of the favour with which he had so lately been honoured. The reply was such as he expected it would be. ‘Why,’ asked James, ‘why did you refuse to send me the maiden whom I wrote for, and give despiteful language to him I sent for her?’ Put in this form, the charge was easy to meet. Kirkcaldy dared anyone present to accuse him of disobedience to the King’s command. He had, he admitted, declined to give Helen Leslie into the Prior’s keeping ”

“ But there is evidence that he was at St Andrews in the beginning of June. It was there that John Knox first proposed to him that they should endeavour to obtain assistance from Queen Elizabeth. ‘If England would but see her own advantage,’ the Reformer said, ‘Yea, if she would consider the dangers wherein she is standing herself, she would not suffer us to perish in this quarrel; for France hath decreed no less the conquest of England than of Scotland.’ As the result of their ‘long reasoning,’ it was resolved that Kirkcaldy should open negotiations with the English. ”

“ Of these, Kirkstead was Cistercian, and Stixwould and Stainfield were nunneries. They were all most ruthlessly and utterly destroyed by Thomas Cromwell at the dissolution, so it is only the history of them that we can speak about.
Kirkstead Chapel.
Stixwould and Kirkstead were originally as much in the fen as Bardney; but since the “Dales Head Dyke” was cut parallel with the Witham and about a mile to the west from “Metheringham Delph” to “Billinghay Skirth,” the land between it and the river is known as the “Dales.” ”

“ KIRKCALDY or KIRKALDY, Sir JAMES (d. 1556) , of Grange, lord high treasurer of Scotland, was descended from the elder branch of a family which at a very early period had been settled in Fifeshire, his father being William Kirkaldy of Grange. Introduced to the court of James V by his father-in-law, Sir John Melville of Raith, he soon became a special favourite of the king, who made him a lord of the bedchamber, and on 24 March 1537 appointed him lord high treasurer of Scotland. He was one of the chief opponents of the ambitious political projects of Cardinal Beaton and the ecclesiastics. ”

“ Then I realized that all through the years the old rattlesnake had been watching for his chance. It was a frame-up from beginning to end, and my father stepped into the trap. Even then he thought that his political enemies, and not Kirkstone, were at the bottom of it. We soon discovered the truth. My father got ten years. He was innocent. And the only man on earth who could prove his innocence was Kirkstone, the man who was gloating like a Shylock over his pound of flesh. ”

“ Calendar?"
For a space the quiet was disturbed by harsh breathing; then, in a strained voice, "Good day, Mr. Kirkwood"; and again the sound of departing footfalls.
Kirkwood closed the door and the incident simultaneously, with a smart bang of finality. Laughing quietly he went back to the window with its dreary outlook, now the drearier for lengthening evening shadows.
"I wonder what his game is, anyway. An adventurer, of course; the woods are full of 'em. A queer fish, even of his kind! And with a trick up his sleeve as queer and fishy as himself, no doubt!" ”

“ By none was the valiant Master of Rothes more deeply and more sincerely regretted than by his companion in many a perilous adventure—William Kirkcaldy. He [50] had been given the command of a hundred light horsemen; and with these he had been sent out on a secret expedition, from which he did not return till the day after the fatal skirmish. Within a few hours, the battle of Renti afforded him and his Scots an opportunity of avenging their countryman. That he who was ‘like a lion in the field’ did not spare the enemy may well be assumed. ”