226 Field Meetings. 



punch bowl and the " jougs," that were wont to clasp the neck of 

 petty criminals, produced for their inspection. 



Kenmure Castle neighbours New-Galloway at a distance of 

 only about half-a-mile. It was reached by the party shortly 

 before four o'clock; and here there were a wealth of most inter- 

 esting things to see and curious narratives to hear. The Castle 

 is held on lease by Mr and Mrs John Gordon from their relative, 

 Mr J. C. Maitland Gordon, the representative in the female line 

 of the Viscounts Kenmure. Mr Gordon is at present in the 

 Argentine, where he has large interests. In his absence Mrs 

 Gordon received the party, and she proved a charming and atten- 

 tive hostess and cicerone. The early history of the castle is asso- 

 ciated with the Lords of Galloway and with the Baliols, intb 

 whose family the daughter of Alan, the last of these Lords, 

 married. One of the towers is known as the Baliol. It is 

 believed to have been erected by the saintly and munificent Lady 

 Devorgilla, and it is one of the reputed birthplaces of her son, 

 King John Baliol, although the more generally accepted view 

 favours the claims of Buittle Castle, near Dalbeattie, to whatever 

 distinction that event may confer. It is as the seat of the 

 Gordons that Kenmure figures in story. That is the family of 

 " the young Lochinvar " of Scott's ballad; and it was not simply 

 as Viscount Kenmure, but also as Lord Lochinvar, that Sir John 

 Gordon was advanced to the dignity of a Scottish peer in 1633. 

 The family had previously been enriched by numerous royal gifts 

 of land, including one made to his predecessor. Sir Robert, of 

 the confiscated possessions of the Abbey of Lincluden lying in the 

 parish of Crossmichael. It is a singular circumstance that while 

 the first Lord Kenmure received his peerage at the hands of 

 Charles I., he was also the close friend of Samuel Rutherford, 

 who was the stout asserter of liberty of conscience against State 

 interference, and in his "Lex Rex " assailed the royal preroga- 

 tive as interpreted by the Stuarts. Rutherford found in the 

 Viscount a devout man of kindred soul, and wrote a memoir of 

 him entitled " The Last and Heavenly Speeches and Glorious 

 Departure of John, Viscount Kenmure." The Viscountess, a 

 sister of the martyred Marquis of Argyle, was also the recipient of 

 many of Rutherford's pious letters. It is to this first" Viscount 

 that New-Galloway owes its position as a royal burgh, a rank that 

 was conferred upon it by royal charter in 1629. The fourth 



