CRATHES CASTLE 



Crathes Castle in Kincardineshire presents one of the finest examples 

 of Scottish architecture of the sixteenth century. It is the seat of Sir 

 Robert Burnett of Leys, the eleventh baronet and descendant of the founder. 



Profoundly impressive are these great northern buildings, rising 

 straight and tall out of the very earth. As to their low^er w^alls, they are 

 grim, forbidding, almost fiercely repellent. There is an aspect of 

 something like ruthless cruelty in the very way they come out of the 

 ground, w^ithout base or plinth or any such amenity — built in the old 

 barbarous days of frequent raiding and fighting, and constant need of 

 protection from marauders ; w^hen a man's house must needs be a strong 

 place of defence. 



This is the first impression. But the eye travelling upward sees the 

 frowning wall blossom out above into what has the semblance of a fairy 

 palace. It is like a straight, tall, rough-barked tree crowned with fairest 

 bloom and tenderest foliage. Turrets both round and square, as if in 

 obedience to the commanding wave of a magician's wand, spring out of 

 the angles of the building and hang with marvellous grace of poise over 

 the abyss. There seems to be no actual plan, and yet there is perfect 

 harmony ; the whole beautiful mass appears as if it had come into being 

 in some one far-away, wonderful, magical night ! It is a sight full of 

 glamour and romantic impression — grim fortalice below, ethereal fantasy 

 aloft. Rough and rugged is the rock-like wall, standing dark and dim in 

 the evening gloom ; intangible, opalescent are the mystic forms above, in 

 the tender warmth of the afterglow ; cloud-coloured, faintly rosy, with 

 shadows pearly-blue, 



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