SCOTTISH GARDENS 



Similarly, the house, which in the fifteenth 

 century must have been but a pele tower of the 

 ordinary type, owned by the family of Strang 

 (whence was descended Sir Robert Strange, who 

 engraved bank-notes for Prince Charlie), passing by 

 marriage to a grandson of Moncrieff of that ilk, was 

 sold in the seventeenth century to Sir William 

 Bruce, architect of Charles II.'s Palace of Holyrood- 

 house, who transformed the fortalice of Balcaskie 

 into a fair Jacobean manor house. His handiwork 

 is easily recognised in the characteristic flanking 

 towers and pavilions, the details of the mouldings, 

 and especially in the wonderfully rich plaster-work 

 of the ceilings, which rival the masterpieces of that 

 kind of decoration in Holyrood. It was an age 

 when the classical renaissance, having spent its 

 force on the Continent, still flowed strongly in the 

 northern realm ; in token whereof are ranged the 

 busts of Roman emperors along the principal 

 terrace, each on the top of a mighty buttress of 

 the vertical wall. Nymphs, agreeably discoloured, 

 fauns picturesquely chipped, haunt the surrounding 

 groves, posed on pedestals beside the woodland 

 paths ; nor shall you look in vain for le petit dieu, 

 dont les yeux sont caches, mais les f esses a decouvert. 



Evidence of a genial climate abounds in the 

 vegetation of these grounds. An enormous Wistaria 

 trails its serpentine length along the south front of 

 the house, where is also to be seen on this May 

 morning a pretty picture, formed by a white fantail 



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