DUMFKIESSIIIIIIO AXD GALLOWAY A CkNTUKY AGO. 73 



SO radical a chang-e lias taken place in both sentiment and practice 

 as reg-ards the sacraments that a very staunch and earnest Episco- 

 palian clergyman not long- since remarked to me that he thought 

 an open-air celebration of the Holy Communion, at which he had 

 been present in the island of Arran. was one of the most solemn 

 and impressive scenes he had ever witnessed. 



The sacrament of baptism did not escape the desecrating 

 accompaniment of whisky. Whether the ceremony was performed 

 in private houses, or several infants were brought to some con- 

 venient place arrang'ed beforehand, treating the minister after- 

 wards was a common practice. A very old man of Mr Wilson's 

 acquaintance once told him he distinctly remembered, when one of 

 the younger members of his family was baptised, hearing his 

 father ask his mother for half-a-ccown •' to treat the minister." 



Of funerals litt'e need be said. A century ago it was no 

 uncommon thing for five, even six rounds of whisky to be served 

 out before the party started for the churchyard, with additional 

 supplies after their return to the house. Hence it is easy to credit 

 a well-known story of a fimei-ai party arriving- at the churchyard 

 and then discovering they had quite forgotten to bring the coffin 

 with them. 



Another proof of the low moral tone of the age is the open 

 complicity of people in a most respectable position, even of 

 ministers, with smuggling-. The traffic was carried on between 

 the Galloway coast and the Isle of Man to an enormous extent, 

 and one of the charges against the Rev. Robert Carson, minister 

 of Anwoth, who was deposed from his office by the Presbytery 

 somewhere about 1770, was " that he not only smuggled himself 

 but encouraged others to follow the same unlawful practice." 

 Farmers and tradesmen of respectable position, even men of much 

 higher social standing, were frequently implicated in the nefarious 

 traffic. Balcary House, on the shores of the Solway, is said to 

 have been originally built by a firm of smugglers, and I believe 

 the construction of the cellars, with a view to safe concealment of 

 smuggled goods, is most ciu-ious. At numberless farms along the 

 coasts such places of concealment were rife. One ingenious 

 method was brought to light in 1777 by Mr Reid, Inspector- 

 General of Customs, who brought from Edinburgh with him two 

 thoroughly practised drainers. They soon discovered uuder-cellars 

 skilfully concealed beneath the ordinary ones, and in the course 



