IS Lifp: of Macmillan. 



not of age. '' Why was not I born two months sooner?" he asks, 



in a note to his fiancee, after he had passed his " trials" for hcense, 



but got no license after all. But in the seventeenth century mere 



striplings were licensed freely. I have noted the following* cases 



from the " Scots Worthies " as illustrations : — 



John Welsh, born 1.570, minister at Selkirk, Kirkcudbright, and 

 lastly at Ayr, in 1590 ; aged 20. 



James Mitchell, born 1621 ; M.A. at eighteen. 



Andrew Gray, born 1634 ; licensed at nineteen. 



Hugh Binning, became Professor of Philosophy in Glasg'ow Uni- 

 versity at eighteen. 



Hugh M'Kail, born 1640 ; licensed when about twenty. 



It is quite possible, therefore, that a lad of eighteen might be 



licensed, and even a year after become minister of Bahnaghie. 



Macmillan's youthfulness might explain his mixture of firmness and 



wavering in the conflict with the Presbytery. 



All authorities agree that Macmillan was connected with the 



famil}' of Arndarroch, in the barony of Earlston. Oddlj' enough, 



Macmillan, for his second wife, married a daughter of Sir Alex. 



Gordon of Earlston. Brockloch, in Carsphairn, seems to have been 



the chief Macmillan centre. The present proprietor of Lamloch 



in that parish has not, however, any evidence of connection Avith 



our Macmillan. 



2. The question of heraldry is not unimportant, and I now 

 shew Macmillaii s seal^ with the two-handed sword and lion ram- 

 pant and motto from Virg. yEn. i. 630 (miseris succurrere disco). 

 The same crest and motto are used by the Palgown branch, omit- 

 ting- the lion rampant. Another Macmillan family use the lion 

 rampant alone, with a different motto — age et perficc. 



3. I have obtained a platinotype of fly-leaf of Macmillan's 

 family Bible, which I exhibit. This throws a faint light on the 

 question of his exact branch, favourable to my somewhat daring 

 conjecture as to Glenhead. His youngest child was, strangely 

 enough, christened Alexa?ider Janeta or Jonita. The writer in 

 the Glenhead Confession of Faith is Alexander Macnn'llau, and. 

 according to my guess, would be the grandfather of this little child 

 named after him. 



More certain is the information in this tly-leaf on Macmillan's 

 movements after his deposition in 1703. His first child, Jonas, 

 was born in 1726 (12th June), at Balmaghie Manse; but the 



