574 



The Country Gcntlcvmns Magazine 



notwithstanding all his failings, one of 

 the brightest examples of Nature's own 

 nobility. 



Mr Baird's residence is situated on the 

 river Doon, quite in proximity to the ground 

 we have touched upon. The ornamental 

 features of the pleasure-grounds are very much 

 enhanced by the river, with its " banks and 

 braes," and the grass terracing and artistic 

 borders, and beds of flowers are captivating. 

 These sloping gardens, reminding one of the 

 hanging Babylonic gardens of antient history, 

 have a peculiar charm, more particularly 

 when we look to the solitude that must ever 

 be associated with them. The murmuring of 

 the water rill over the pebbly boulders, and 

 the limited range of vision by the side of the 

 meandering stream, necessarily begetting quiet- 

 ness and solitude in every way well-fitted for 

 creating poetic rapture. Mr Baird has also 

 an auxiliary garden, with a range of forcing- 

 houses, and a well-appointed home farm, 

 which the eye skipped over en passant. To 

 this must be added a fine stud of horses that 

 met our gaze pacing lightly and gracefully 

 along on a morning promenade. 



By this time the appetite was beginning to 

 assert its prerogative, tacitly inviting the eye 

 to rest for a while from its labours, and in 

 obedience to physical demands, we made all 

 haste to our hotel, had a substantial break- 

 fast, shouldered our valises, and, after fairly 

 satisfying all reasonable demands, got to the 

 station in time to catch the early train from 

 Glasgow to Kilkerran. The agricultural 

 aspect of Ayrshire generally was more favour- 

 able than any of the other western counties 

 over which we travelled. True, root crops 

 were a partial failure, but then in some 

 places, as, for example, Kirkcudbright-and 

 Wigton-shires, they were all but a total fail- 

 ure. The fields, as far as the eye could 

 reach, from Ayr through Maybole to Kil- 

 kerran, had a good appearance, and the 

 yield, in some of the farms in that district, 

 must have been quite up to the average, 

 Mr Barnwell, the head gardener at Kil- 

 kerran, was in waiting at the station to 

 receive us, and we found ourselves quickly 

 within the dress grounds of the policies. 



IV. KILKERRAN. 



Thisfineestate, which comprise 22,000 acres 

 of very rich alluvial soil, belongs to Sir James 

 Fergusson, who has been for some time, both 

 before and since his official appointments in 

 connexion with the present Government, a 

 non-resident at Kilkerran. He has, there- 

 fore, meantime let his mansion, garden, and 

 pleasure-grounds to Mr. J. Fleming, and his 

 home farm, we beheve, to Mr J. Nicol 

 Fleming, a brother of the present occupant 

 of the mansion, and a well-known agri- 

 culturist, distinguished for his choice 

 stock. Among them, and the spirited 

 farmers of the neighbourhood, we can truly 

 say that the face of the earth is well cared 

 for, whether as regards agricultural husbandry 

 and all things in connexion therewith, or 

 horticulture in its many ramified details, com- 

 prising, of course, the production of fruit, 

 flowers, and vegetables, general tidiness, and 

 arboricultural features of a very high order. 

 Keeping to the order of inspection as ar- 

 ranged by Mr Barnwell, we shall reproduce 

 our notes in the order they were taken, and 

 at once emerge into the Flower Garden, 



This forms an adjunct of the garden proper, 

 being walled off from it transversely by means 

 of a high brick wall, which is, in turn, utilized 

 for the production of fruit, and some choice 

 cHmbers, of which we shall hereafter speak. 

 It is shut out exclusively from the road, on 

 one side, by a continuation of the north wall, 

 which runs up to, and forms a buttress for, 

 the gardener's bothies — an indispensable 

 adjunct to all horticultural establishments. 

 On the south side, which first confronts the 

 eye, there is a deep valley, and that valley 

 has been planted with spruce, which have 

 attained a gigantic size. Indeed, the eye first 

 catches this sombre background, made up as 

 it is with individuals of strict formal outline. 

 Elsewhere they would be out of place, not- 

 withstanding their portly figure, but here, as 

 a back screen to a forest of flowers and 

 geometrical beds, they are in keeping. Such 

 an array with the undulating foreground, 

 would have delighted Humphry Repton, 

 one of the most precise, and probably one 

 of the best, judges of a landscape either con- 



