292 Dumfries Treasurers' Accounts. 



and the committee that year seem to have confined themselves 

 to the 1639 account. Perhaps the serious increase in the dis- 

 bursements that year was the cause of the investigation. 



The accounts themselves are of some interest, as the 

 Town Council Minutes for the period do not exist. They 

 therefore help to fill a gap in the history of the town. Apart 

 from the information they yield on such subjects as wages and 

 the price of commodities, they throw some light on the 

 burghal life and activities of the period. From them we learn 

 of the fees paid to the Provost, the bailies, officers, and other 

 officials. The town would seem to have had minstrels, a bell- 

 ringer, and a herd. William Edgar, doctor, was not a medi- 

 cal practitioner, but the under-teacher in the school. The 

 medical profession may have been represented by Homer 

 Glencross, who received ^2 i6s for setting a boy's arm. In 

 the person of George Ramsay we have the precursor of the 

 present-day postman. Several entries relate to the public 

 buildings of the burgh. The so-called Dervorgilla's Bridge 

 came in for repairs, though it had been almost rebuilt little 

 more than a dozen years before. In 1635, ^^ least 14 men 

 were employed during the space of 21 days in repairs which 

 necessitated the use of 320 new stones for the brig, whilst five 

 days' work which necessitated the use of scaffolding were 

 entailed in 1637. The rebuilding after the great storm of 

 1620 cannot have been a very satisfactory job. Extensive 

 alterations were made in the school buildings. The Kirk was 

 in part repaired and renovated, new windows, properly glazed, 

 being put in. The accounts also bear out the statements of 

 Edgar's MS. History of Dumfries relating to horse-racing at 

 the Stoup, the riding of the marches, and weaponschawin 

 days. The racing was an annual affair, which must have 

 evoked much interest. As much as ;^i5o was spent on the 

 silver cups given by the Town Council. We learn, too, that 

 the silver muck bell cost ;^i2 los. 



Only one distinguished visitor to the burgh is mentioned. 

 At the end of the summer 1635, ^^e Lord Treasurer of Scot- 

 land, William Douglas, 6th Earl of Morton, accompanied by 

 members of the nobility, stopped in Dumfries. They were 

 entertained in George Sharpe's house, a building known also 



