88 Echoes of the 18th Century. 



shire and Devonshire. 2. Mr James Barbour showed a sheet of 

 the insignia of the town of Dumfries. 



Communications. 



1. Echoes oj the I8th Century. By Mrs Brown, Barnkin of 



Craigs. 



These echoes of the 18th century are some of the spoils of an 

 old cupboard in which lie heaped in confusion a mass of papers 

 and letters gathered from the chambers of two lawyers — Mr 

 William Veitch, Writer to the Signet, practising in Edinburgh 

 early in the 18th century ; and his son, Mr James Veitch, 

 advocate, better known (at least in legal circles) as Lord Eliock, 

 one of the most distinguislied Judges of the latter part of the 

 century. Mr William Veitch was extensively connected with 

 the management of the forfeited estates, after the rising on 

 behalf of the exiled Stuarts in 1715, and was thus brought into 

 close connection with Dumfriesshire and Galloway. It is only 

 necessary to run over the list of names of those taken prisoner, 

 on the surrender of Preston to see how terrible was the havoc 

 worked in this part of Scotland by the failure of that ill-managed 

 enterprise. Among them we find — Lords Nithsdale and 

 Kenmure, Hamilton of Baldoon, Grierson of Lagg, Riddel of 

 Glen Riddel, Maxwell of Steilston, Maxwell of Carnsalloch, 

 Maxwell of Munches, Maxwell of Oowhill, <fec. Another name 

 which then disappeared for ever from the list of Dumfriesshire 

 landed proprietors was that of LordCarnwath, who had inherited 

 the estate of Eliock through, I believe, the marriage of an 

 ancestor with the sister of the Admirable Crichton. Mr Wm. 

 Veitch acted for both Lord Carnwath and his only sister, the 

 heroic wife of Lord Kenmure. Some of their letters to him are 

 very pathetic, telling of the ruin brought upon them by their 

 devotion to the ill-fated House of Stuart. In 1723 Eliock 

 became the property of Mr William Veitch, and on the 10th of 

 September in that year Lord Carnwath writes to him as follows 

 from London : — 



Dear William, — I have now had both yours with respect to 

 the sale of my estates, and your descret management of that 

 affair pleases me much, and I am very thankful that you have 

 done that favour for me. I design to leave this place as next 



