1 2 Transactions. 



and make it appear tliat such unwelcome parishioners were 

 plentiful enough. Even this is exclusive of one of which nothing 

 is known, but whose memory is only kept green by the name of 

 the old Castle of Wreaths, which is said to be derived from the 

 word " wraith " or apparition. The ghost itself seems to have 

 vanished, and it probably disappeared with the destruction of the 

 dense forest which is said to have surrounded the old castle. 



Taking the haunts of the ghosts in the order of a journey from 

 Dumfries, the first is that which is said to have been frequented 

 by a lady in white. This is on the main road shortly after 

 entering the parish and close to a plantation of trees. Here in 

 the shade of the trees, and with no sound near save the rushing 

 of a neighbouring stream, this lady is said to have alarmed the 

 passers-by. No one can tell me anything more about this ghost^ 

 and it is probable that even its reputed existence would have 

 been forgotten had it not been that the belief in this supernatural 

 being was turned to account in an ingenious way. A young 

 woman living at a neighbouring farm was in the habit of meeting 

 her sweetheart at a part of the road near the haunted spot, and 

 in order to secure herself from annoyance was wont to wear a 

 white sheet when going to the trysting place. Tradition says 

 that this love affair was none the less prosperous from the 

 apparent want of reverence for the supernatural, but that the 

 lovers were eventually joined in the bonds of matrimony. 



The next ghost we hear of with more detail, and the story is a 

 tragic one with an ending in sharp contrast to that of the one 

 just told. It is said to have haunted what is known as the 

 " Three Cross Roads," near Arbigland, a lonely spot, where, on 

 a wild night, the dread feeling which was in these days felt in 

 the deep darkness caused by the surrounding trees must have 

 been intensified by the sound of the wind through their branches, 

 and the roar of the waves of the boisterous Solway. The ghost 

 was generally supposed to be that of a young man, and the tale 

 is a romantic one, which, in the hands of an accomplished novelist, 

 would form a thrilling narrative. As is pretty well known, 

 Arbigland at one time belonged to a family of%he name of Craik. 

 Its then representative had a daugliter who, it is s:iid, had 

 become attached to a young man named Dunu, who was in her 

 father's employment as a groom or horse-breaker. One day a 

 shot was heard, and soon after the lifeless body of Dunn was 

 found near where the ghost was said afterwards to ap[)eHr. In 



