STONEHAVEN TO CORTACHY. 229 



a time, and it has also been a resting-place, tem- 

 porary or final, for distinguished Shorthorns. Lord 

 Raglan came here from Lord Kinnaird's when he 

 was a two-year-old, and was passed on to Sittyton for 

 100. Young Ben, the winner of the aged bull 

 class in '61 at Dublin, was fed off here, and so was 

 the victorious Ivanhoe of the deep forequarter. The 

 weary age of Rose of Autumn, who founded the 

 Athelstaneford herd, found here a peaceful her- 

 mitage, when she had taken her second gold me- 

 dium medal as a fifteen-year-old at Perth, and was 

 sold to his lordship "at butchers' price if not in- 

 calf." Her days were nearly over, but the herds- 

 man still dwelt lovingly on her "pleasant counte- 

 nance" and her " grand braid hurdies." 



Ere the family piper had done pacing the sward 

 in front of the Castle, and sounding his reveille 

 through the crisp, bracing air, we had finished our 

 stroll with the dairy. It is a pretty cottage building 

 at the end of the flower- walk. The effect of the in- 

 terior is all the more striking from the utter absence 

 of anything elaborate. The milk-pans are of plain 

 white delf, and the cream testers are marshalled, like 

 the Commissioners on the woolsack in the Reform 

 Bill picture, all in a row on the centre slab, and flanked 

 by blue glass jugs and drinking cups. The curds 

 and cream service stands on a rustic table in 

 Lady Airlie's room, which looks into the dairy, and 

 the plain cocoa-nut matting, the grey stone fender, and 

 the cane-bottomed oak chairs with nothing to " give 



