TRANSACTIONS. 49 
One pre-Reformation memento of the church remains, the bell 
gifted by the Lord of Torthorwald, preserved in the Observatory 
Museum. It is of elegant form and tasteful workmanship. The 
Latin inscription translated runs: ‘“ William de Carlell, Lord of 
Torthorwald, caused me to be made in honour of St. Michael, in 
the year of our Lord 1443.” 
At the time when the old foundations were uncovered five 
tombstones were also exposed within the church at the south-east 
corner, and the state of the soil under the floor showed that the 
practice of burial within the walls prevailed extensively until a 
comparatively recent period. The tombstones are imperfect, but 
on two of them portions of border inscriptions remain. One reads: 
“Heir - Lyis : James Couplan [d] . . . |Dumf]ries - 1665; and 
the other . . . . “J. 8. Johnstoun * Sumtym Thesar” 
Documentary evidence of the custom referred to also exists. A 
draft agreement between the town of Dumfries and the heritors of 
the landward parish, drawn in the year 1709, states the object 
aimed at to be: ‘‘To prevent mistakes and pleas betwixt the town 
and the landward parish anent the division of the seats of the 
church of Dumfries, and the burial places in the church and church- 
yard.” In the year 1744 the Session consulted Mr William Grant, 
advocate, as to their position with those heritors to whom they 
had sold seats in the church ; and Mr Grant gave it as his opinion 
that any heritor of the parish who has acquired by this title of 
grant from the Session of a heritable or perpetual right to a seat 
or burial place in the church his title is good. On the 21st Jan., 
1714, the treasurer received two guineas from Geo. Gordon of 
Grange “‘ for the liberty of his father’s corps lying in the Session 
[house] ;’ and in the year 1721, Mr Veitch was granted a burial 
place within the church for himself and his wife. The two following 
instances of this custom are of some interest. In the AZemorials of 
St. Michael’s Mr M‘Dowall remarks on the absence in the church- 
yard of any monument in memory of the great family of M‘Brair. 
The explanation of the omission is to be found in the fact that the 
family burial place was situated within the church. A minute of 
Session, dated 8th Nov., 1705, after narrating that Robert M‘Brair 
of Netherwood is allowed to erect a seat for twelve or sixteen per- 
sons in the M‘Brair Aisle, proceeds, “and finally the Session consents 
to the preserving of his right of burial place in the said isle as has 
been in use and wont by his predecessors ;’ and on 8th June, 1747, 
after the present church was built, the Provost reported “ that the 
