Transactions. 121 



superior the Master of the Temple. Their headquarters were iu 

 Fleet Street, London, still called The Temple, with its beautiful 

 circular-shaped church, which dates from A.D. 1185, in which ser- 

 vices are still given. Their habits were white, with a red Maltese- 

 shaped cross on the mantle over the heart, as so admirably depicted 

 before you, with the others, to illustrate this paper, by Mr M'Lel- 

 lan Arnott. 



The old order chang-es alike in Church and State — even the 

 proud knights " their swords are rust, their bones are dust." But 

 the spirit that animated these Orders at their origin was good, and 

 cau never die. The Monks kept the lamp of literature lit through 

 what has been well called the Dark Ages, and their Monasteries 

 were safe as^dums to rich and poor ; while the religious knights 

 were the first to inculcate true chivalry and courtesy towards 

 women. The Monastic system bioke down at last because it had 

 departed from its primitive simplicity of life and allied itself with 

 wealth and worldly power. In regard to these Abbeys, as we 

 call them, which were only the churches of the Abbeys, we won- 

 der how they could have been filled with worshippers. But we 

 must remember that the ancient Church of Scotland was almost 

 wholly monastic, and that most of the parish churches became 

 subject to a monastery. Abbeys and Priories were to be met with 

 everywhere, and the monastic habit was a familiar dress not only 

 in country districts but in the town of Dumfries 500 years ago. 

 These buildings contained within their walls a vast number of per- 

 sons, and outside of them were baronies, villages, g-rauges, and 

 hamlets, of which the names only now survive. In the neighbour- 

 hood of Dumfries there were the baronies of Torthorwald, Rock- 

 hall, Mouswald. Lincluden, Holywood, and Drumsleet, then 

 inhabited by vassals and by dependants and artisans in every 

 vocation of life. 



3. — Tlie Old Water Supply of Dumfries, and the Progress of the 



Water Supply in the Toivn. 



By Mr James Barbour, Architect. 



Prior to the construction of the existing gravitation works, 

 more than forty years ago, the town derived its supply of water 

 chiefly from the river Nith. The minor sources consisted of sur- 

 face wells and pump and draw wells. 



