EarR.Ly ECCLESIASTICAL History oF DuNScoRE. 483 
Mr Carlyle Aitken, was the son of a Dunscore laird,!® was 
presented to the vicarage.!” Mr Aitken states that he was 
previously a chaplain in Dumfries; and certainly numerous 
instruments are extant to which he was a witness, and in 
which he is designated chaplain.!8 He executed the office of 
reader from 1574 to 1585.19 
The next incumbent was Mr George Harrat, M.A., who 
was presented on 18th November, 1602, and was _ subse- 
quently translated to Kirkmaho.”° He was succeeded by Mr 
Archibald Gibson, who is mentioned as minister of Dunscore 
in an instrument?! dated in 1606, and in an entry in the 
Register of the Privy Council in 1609.22 He was deposed 
before 22nd June of that year, as on that day David Cunyng- 
hame, M.A., was presented to the cure.% In 1615 George 
Blak was appointed, and he continued to be minister until he 
demitted in the year 1640.% His wife was Agnes, daughter 
of Gilbert Grierson of Chappell ;2 and the only memorials of 
his ministry are supplied by two entries in the Register of the 
Privy Council, one® under date 1617 relating to a complaint 
by him against Kirkpatrick of Friar Carse and others for non- 
payment of dues and contributions, and one”’ under date 1631 
regarding the scandalous conduct of one of his parishioners. 
In the latter case the complaint stated that John Moffat in 
Craigenputtock, a person excommunicated for disobedience 
to the Kirk, had for several years past behaved himself very 
insolently and disgracefully towards the complainer, his 
pastor, for no other cause than the faithful discharge of his 
calling. On [blank], when the complainer was baptising a 
child at the kirk of Dunscore, the said John, accompanied 
by Harbert Hannay, his tenant, came to the kirk,‘ and, 
-while the minister was in the verie actioun of celebrating the 
sacrament of baptism, he twke the lawer aff its proper place 
on the pulpit, and to the contempt of the holie actioun 
despitefullie slang the lawer with the water being in the 
same in the midds of the kirk.’’ Further, he and the said 
tenant continually break down the churchyard walls and 
feed their cattle and sheep within the same, defiling and 
abusing the churchyard with the dung of their bestial as if it 
were a fold or byre. The defenders did not appear, and 
