HISTORY OF THE LINLITHGOW 



the hunting of the country at this period de- 

 volved upon others, the responsibility and the 

 burden of the cost rested mainly with the master. 

 And now the curtain must fall on this long act 

 in which Mr Ramsay has played the principal 

 part. " The bright name which his sire as a 

 sportsman has gained," had become his by suc- 

 cession, and in his keeping had remained an 

 inheritance untarnished, since for twenty years 

 Mr Ramsay ruled the Linlithgow and Stirling- 

 shire as a sportsman, maintaining the proudest 

 traditions of the old Hunt, faithfully, liberally, 

 and manfully. But a lifetime, scarcely greater 

 than that allotted to Mr George Ramsay, was to 

 be accorded to his son, and before the latter had 

 completed his forty - first year, the country had 

 lost its master, and Barn ton its " Squire." Mr 

 Ramsay's death took place at Barnton on the 

 15th of March 1850. "The sphere of his influ- 

 ence and position brought him into close contact 

 with many and various classes of men, and his 

 amiable disposition, gentle and courteous bearing, 

 his cheerful manners, his kind and affectionate 

 heart and liberal hand, endeared him to all. . . . 

 He was beloved by every tenant on his own 

 estates, . . . and in the counties of Mid-Lothian, 

 West Lothian, Stirling and Lanark — the districts 

 which were hunted by his pack of hounds — he 

 was universally respected and esteemed by the 

 farmers. . . . His numerous dependants regarded 

 him more as a kind protector than as a master ; 



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