those tiny elves. Nor, even at this day, has the "deid licht" perhaps entirely ceased to flutter, and throw its ominous gleams across the marshy patches of the East and West Lucks-o'Pagan! Threescore years have not much more than passed away since a humble couple, who resided at Tigerton, were blessed with a son. At his birth, and for some time after, the boy throve as do other healthy children; but his constitution underwent a sudden change, and the thriving infant became decrepit and rickety. This marvellous reverse occupied the attention of the gossips, and various causes were alleged,— among others, that the boy or his mother was bewitched, or, that the rickety child was a substitute for the healthy one, whom the fairies had carried away by stealth to their invisible chambers about the hill of Caterthun! The learned in such matters were anxious to find the truth of these ideas by experiment. If the boy was really of fairy origin, he would, on being placed over a blaze of whins, fly to his native region-if an heir of mortality, he would withstand the fire, and receive, at worst, a slight burn, or scaum! As the Tigerton Hecate was well aware that it would revolt. the feelings of the parents to have their infant subjected to such an ordeal, she watched her opportunity when the mother had left her ailing child in charge of a neighbour on leaving home for a day, and she prevailed on the temporary nurse to allow her to test the boy's human or supernatural being. The experiment was of the highest possible interest. Harvey was not more anxious to discover the circulation of the blood than were those hags to show the truth of their irrational surmises. A favoured few were collected to witness the result, and the scene took place in the ben end of a low thatched cottage. The door was carefully secured, the small window covered up, and the ceremony conducted by whisperings, so that no other human being should witness their unhallowed actions. A bundle of whins was lighted, and stripping the poor child to the skin, MENMUIR UNHALLOWED ORDEAL. 333 they placed him upon the tongs, and held him over the flame! He screamed and struggled, as older people would do in like circumstances; but, as he never attempted to fly out of the chimney, he was declared by the cruel hags, in council assembled, to be merely a human creature after all!! CHAPTER VII. Miscellaneous Lands of the Lindsays. His lands, I ween, stretch'd far an' wide- BALLAD. Now that the history of the Parishes over which the great family of Lindsay of Glenesk once held almost supreme sway has been given, that of their minor estates in other parts of Angus, and of those which they owned on the confines of Perthshire, and in Kincardineshire, will have our attention. The notices of these must be necessarily brief, in consequence of the volume having already reached beyond the limits originally proposed. Our observations will therefore be mainly confined to such facts and traditions as are preserved regarding the Lindsays, and to some of the less generally known historical incidents of the various districts. For the furtherance of our plan, this, the concluding Chapter, will be divided into three Sections the first of these will embrace such of the Lindsay properties as lay in the Highland or North-western parts of Angus, and on the East of Perthshire; the second, the southern portions, or those that were on the south of the Valley of Strathmore in Angus; and the third, such of their lands as lay in the Mearns. SECTION I. LINDSAY PROPERTIES IN THE NORTH-WESTERN PARTS OF ANGUS, AND ON THE EAST OF PERTHSHIRE. Miscellaneous properties-Brechin-Forket acre-Brechin and Pitairlie-Keithock— passed to the Edgars-Secretary Edgar-Bishop Edgar-Keithock's toastLittle Pert-Glenquiech held by the Lindsays-Preceded by the Stuarts, Earls of Buchan-Shielhill and chapel of St. Colm-The water-kelpie-Inverquharity and early proprietors-Ogilvys of Airlie and Inverquharity-Baronets of Inverquharity Balinscho or Benshie - Serymgeours and Ogilvys-Lindsays of LINDSAYS OF KEITHOCK. 335 Balinscho-Two chestnut-trees -The Fletchers-Chapel of St. Ninian and burial-place-Clova-Feuds-The old Peel-Parochial district and chapelGlaslet, Rottall, Easter and Wester Lethnot, Gella, Braeminzeon-Bakie Castle-Passed to the Lyons-Chapel of Bakie-Kirk of Airlie-Dunkeny Ruthven, Queich, Alyth-Corb, Inverqueich-Murder of Lord LindsayHaunted lady-Meigle-Its early proprietorship-Its later-Church and burialplace. Brechin, Keithock, and Little Pert. THE Lindsay interest in the district of Brechin is of old date, and has been of a varied and important nature. From the time of the first settlement of the family in Forfarshire, they showed great favour for the Cathedral of Brechin. Sir Alexander of Glenesk, as before shown, erected the kirk of Finhaven into a prebend of that church; and his son, the first Earl of Crawford, endowed a chaplainry in its chapel of St. Beternan (probably St. Ethernan or Eddran),1 to the revenues of which his descendant, the Duke of Montrose, also added considerably shortly before his death. It was during the time of the Duke, however, when the Lindsays attained the meridian of their power, that they had most interest there, a circumstance which arose from the Duke having the liferent of the lordship of Brechin and Navar from the King, in acknowledgment of his services at the rising at Blackness. But the earliest notice of them as landowners in Brechin occurs in 1508, when Richard Lindsay owned the house and land called the Forket Acre, the rent of which, with other properties, was mortified to the Cathedral by James Iv.2 This place is described in the charter of resignation of 1511 as lying on the west side of the city, and is still known to some old people as part of the property called the Bank of Brechin, near the south-west part of the Latch Road, on the north side. It was resigned at the above date, as "le Forket Aker," by Alexander Lindsay, " communi fabre in Brechin," to David Lyon of Kinnell. This Alexander Lindsay was one of a long line of 1 Lives, i. p. 103. See Smith and Wace, Dict. Ch. Biog. ii. p. 232. 2 Reg. Ep. Brech. ii. pp. 19, 159; Black, Hist. Brech. p. 32. 3 Fraser, Hist. Carnegies of Southesk, i. p. xv; ii. p. 527. hereditary blacksmiths of the same name, who, for the making and mending of ploughs and sheep-shears, had certain annual payments in meal and wool from various farms in the lordship, and the pasture of two cows and a horse at Haughmuir. It is probable that they continued to enjoy the office of common blacksmith down to at least the year 1616, at which period the name occurs for the last time in the minute-book of the Hammermen, in the council of which craft one or other of them acted from the earliest date, as they had done in the municipal courts of the burgh. Perhaps the Brechin Lindsays failed through females, for in 1672 the "co-heiresses of John Lindsay, residenter in Brechin," had annuities furth of the lands of Craighead of Finhaven. Sir John, the uncle of Earl Beardie, and one of his unfortunate kinsmen who fell at the battle of Brechin, was designed of Brechin and Pitairlie; but whether he had a residence in the city, or why he is so entitled, is unknown to us. It is true that the Earls of Crawford are traditionally said to have had a residence in Brechin, and an old large three-story house on the north side of the Nether Wynd Street (near the Cathedral) is pointed out as the spot. A well on the property has borne from time immemorial the name of Beardie's Well, and the rental of this tenement is said to have been given by him to the Cathedral, for saying mass for the soul of his mother. It is probable, however, that if the family did not reside there, it had been the site of their granary, or the place where their vassals or tenants deposited their meal, of which, and other payments in kind, ancient rentals were mostly composed. It was in the early part of the sixteenth century that David, 1 The farms which were bound to pay these dues were Balnabrech, Kindrokat [Kintrockat], Petpollokis, Pittendrech, Hauch de Brechin [Haughinuir], Buthirgille [Burghill], Pettintoschall ["The Haugh of Pantaskall, at the west end of Balbirnie miln."-(Paper in the Southesk charter-chest, regarding the water for driving the mill of Balbirnie and the new mill of Pantaskall, A.D. 1574)], Balbirny, and the mill thereof, Kincragie, and Leuchlandi.-(Inquis. Spec. Forfar. No. 594, Suppl., ii. ; Misc. Sp. Club, v. p. 291; Fraser, Hist. Carnegies of Southesk, ii. p. 527, App.) 2 Quoted ut sup. p. 45. 3 Inquis. Spec. Forfar, No. 456. 4 Pitairlie, in Monikie, is uniformly called Pitcairlie in the Lives, |