120 RECORDS OF THE BURGH OF LOCHMABEN. 
to Captain Brown to the amount of £23 15s, which, with £6, the 
expense of the said Bailies’ journey to Edinburgh, the meeting 
agreed to instruct the Treasurer to pay the sum of £29 15s as 
above stated. 
Coming events cast their shadows before. On 16th Novem- 
ber, 1821, the Magistrates, in accordance with previous 
instructions, gave in a report to the Council showing the total 
indebtedness of the burgh to be £2023. They stated that the 
whole of the debts specified were borrowed upon the credit of the 
revenues of the town, and faithfully applied for the town’s use 
and behoof in the payment of the town’s former debts, with 
interest and other charges to which the town was subjected. 
They unanimously declared the whole of the sums reported to be 
debts due by the burgh, and payable out of the properties and 
revenues thereof. 
At a meeting held on 11th January, 1822, the Provost 
reported that he and other acceptors of a bill due by the burgh 
to the Affectionate Society of Lochmaben had been served with 
a Charge of Horning following upon a Durett, and also that a 
summons had been served upon them at the instance of other 
creditors. It was resolved in these circumstances to call 
together the burgh’s creditors and lay a statement of affairs 
before them. 
16th April, 1822.—The Magistrates and Council, taking into 
consideration that the burgh has been led into many embarrass- 
ments from the Town Clerk not residing within the burgh, it was 
agreed that he should be informed by the Depute Clerk that unless 
he choose to reside within the burgh and afford his professional 
aid to the Magistrates and Council on all occasions and emer- 
gencies, he shall forthwith be superseded and some other efficient 
professional person nominated to supply his place. 
A meeting of creditors of the burgh was held on 2nd May, 
1822, but owing to the absence of important books and documents, 
said to be in the possession of former Provosts and Town Clerks, 
nothing definite was resolved upon, the Council in the meantime 
instructing legal proceedings to be taken for their recovery. 
On 30th May, 1822, the minute runs that “the Magistrates 
and Council took into consideration the embarrassed state of the 
burgh’s affairs, and as their case is of a novel kind, they therefore 
agreed that John Thomson, writer in Lockerbie, should be 
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