TRANSACTIONS, 113 
Reformation era, we may yet discern the effigy and cultured face 
of this once famous John, as drawn from the sculptured stone, and 
which, as Antiquary Riddell, of Glenriddell, notes as a sketch, was 
“A drawing of the head of John de Sacro-Bosco, which Mr 
Cardonel took for me when he discovered it in the parish church of 
Terregles in 1788, and which effigy, as having formerly stood in 
the church of Holywood, the Lord Maxwell had caused to be 
removed to Terregles Church at the Reformation.” We may thus 
presume that this famous Abbot was buried at his own Abbey of 
Holywood. Concerning the early history of the Abbey of Holy- 
wood, we have such knowledge as is to be gleaned from occasional 
notices as fragmentary as they are inconsecutive in point of date. 
The Lord Maxwell, the Warden-hereditary of the West Marshes 
of Scotland, we find by early chartered evidences, had been the 
great chief natural Protector and Guardian Bailie of nearly the 
whole of the splendid Revival structures and great religious houses 
of the Lords of Galloway and of the south-west of Scotland in 
general. Not one of the least worthy of note was this Abbey of 
Holywood, as lying within the territory of the Lord Maxwell. 
Also figuring as of the ancient Abbots and Commendators of 
Holywood, we meet with certain Campbells, called “ of Lowden 
and Mauchline ;” Crichtons of Librie, of the Lord Crichton of 
Sanquhar’s family ; the Lords Maxwell and Nithsdaill ; Johnstones 
of that ilk, barons of Annandale, who would appear to have been 
among the last possessors of the wider domain lands and church 
barony of Sacrinemoris, or otherwise the “ Barony of Holywood.” 
Among the few ascertained Abbots of this house we discern a 
certain fifteenth century ‘‘ Nicolas Welsh, Lord Abbot of Holywood,” 
who is mentioned, under the year 1480, incidentally in the course 
of some suit before the Lords at Edinburgh. In the “ Taxt Roll 
of Nithsdale” we find the Baronies of Holywood, of Sanquhar, 
Glencairne, and of Drumlanrig, each severally taxed at £120 Scots 
in the year 1554; the “ Monklands of Melrose, in Nithsdale,” in 
the same roll, being taxed at £40 Scots. We also incidentally 
ascertain that the tenants of the Abbey of Holywood, in the ages 
of the old Border raids and wars, had been accustomed to do a 
good deal of tough fighting, following their own Lord Abbot and 
their Guardian, Lord Maxwell, to the field. The baronial lands 
had been leased out in long tacks, granted by the Lord Abbot, in 
name of his abbacy, to certain tacksmen, largely of the Maxwell 
surname, and who you find had oftenest been previously for long 
