48 Transactions. 



short time previous, and were quickly followed by the 

 Dominicans or Black Friars. 



They had eventually eight convents in Scotland, of 

 which Dumfries is reckoned by Spottiswood the third, the 

 first two being Berwick and Roxburgh, both of them under 

 the wardenship or custody of Newcastle. 



The existing church would naturally determine the site 

 of the convent. Not that a church was a regular or even 

 perhaps usual part of a monastery, which was normally but 

 the residence of a fraternity of monks, whose function and 

 mission was not to preach to any stated congregation, but to 

 go from place to place and from house to house hearing 

 confessions and speaking peace to the departing spirit, then 

 returning to their convent with as many of the good things 

 of life as they could collect or get the promise of. But 

 notwithstanding, a church was an advantage, and in that 

 light the church of the town would be regarded. 



If this is a correct idea of the circumstances the build- 

 ings which the Lady Dervorgille actually erected would be 

 the dormitory or sleeping apartments, the refectory or dining 

 hall, a granary, cloisters, and the other usual conventual 

 buildings. The whole, including the church, appears to 

 have been enclosed by a wall with ports or gates at the 

 thoroughfares. 



The monks were mendicants. They professed poverty 

 and received alms. But in order to secure to them a stated 

 revenue, a bridge was erected — the old bridge of Dervorgille 

 — and a power given to the convent to levy dues and cus- 

 toms on all goods and cattle passing, on condition of main- 

 taining and upholding the bridge. 



This grant of bridge dues shows very plainly the power 

 which the Lords of Galloway exercised over the town — thus 

 continued even after it became a royal burgh. For the 

 effect of it was to give the convent a species of control over 

 the ingress into the town, which with our present notions 

 should be vested in the Town Council and in the Town 

 Council alone. 



