y6 Arms of the Royal Burgh of Sanquhar. 



Herald Painter to the Lyon Office, for advice regarding- the 

 Heraldic Customs of Scotland ; and last but by no means 

 least I have to thank Mr Tom Wilson for much help cheer- 

 fully given. Mr Wilson and I by no means see eye to eye 

 with regard to much of our district's history. Perhaps, as 

 Whittier says, " The truth lay doubtless twixt the two." 



The Strathspey Fencibles at Dumfries in 1795. 



By G. W, Shirley. 



A picture of the social life of Dumfries during the closing 

 years of the i8th century would be greatly lacking in coni- 

 pleteness if it omitted an account of the various regiments 

 that, successively, were quartered in the burgh. The officers 

 and men brought increased life, movement, and money to 

 the town. In their different spheres they contracted friend- 

 ships and made acquaintances, and their fortunes after their 

 departure were followed with interest by the people. The 

 officers were admitted to the considerable circle of old county 

 families that then surrounded the town and gave its patron- 

 age to the theatre, libraries, the races, the cock-fights, 

 charities, and shops, and held there its social functions — 

 its assemblies, dinners, and balls. The leading merchant and 

 professional families in the burgh also made the officers 

 welcome. The Magistrates, to evince their esteem, w^ould 

 admit them as honorary burgesses of the burgh and feast 

 generously and gaily in consequence. The parades and 

 marchings of the regiment added picturesque stir and bustle 

 to the town, while at night — but perhaps we had better not 

 specify what took place in the many inns of the town or 

 record the intimacies that sprung up and found results in the 

 police and church courts. Although there was talk in 1794 

 of the erecting of barracks the soldiers seem always to have 

 been quartered on the inhabitants. Six or seven hundred 

 men could not be added to the population of the town, then 

 amounting to 5860 persons, ^ without effecting appreciable 

 results. 



1 Dr Burnside's estimate in his MS. Account, fol. 98. 



