form of structure, than as the actual buildings of the time of Robert Bruce and his son. This holds true even

where we have record of a special licence for the building. In the eleventh Parliament of James III., 2d April 1481, there is an order for the repair and furnishing of castles and strengths near the Border and upon the seacoast.1 We find two of the king's castles named-viz., Dunbar and Lochmaben; and the owners of St Andrews, Aberdeen, Temptallon (Tantallon), Hume, Dowglas, Hailes Adringtowne," and specially the Hermitage, that is in maist danger," are commanded to keep and defend them. Each lord is called upon "to stuffe his awin house, and strength them with victualles, men and artailzierie, and to reparrell them quhair it misters." Long before this period, the land was obviously well covered with castles and castellated houses. They were, in fact, the characteristic features of the old Scottish landscape. Alexander Hume of Polwarth, in his picture of a Scottish summer day -one of the first poems in the language that dared to be literally true to the Scottish landscape-says very characteristically:

2

"The rayons of the sunne we see

Diminish in their strenth;

The schad of everie towre and tree,
Extended is in lenth.

Great is the calm for everie quhair,

The wind is settin downe;

The reik thrawes right up in the air,
From everie towre and towne." 3

And this was written as late as the time of James VI.

We can trace the remains of the mediaval peels in the

1 C. 82.

2 Is needed.

3 Thanks for a Summer Day.

shape of mouldering wall, or ivied gable, or simply green mounds, up the Tweed from Berwick to the Bield. They can be followed, further, up nearly all the side-valleys— up the glens of the waters and the hopes of the burns. The marks of hill-road and bridle-track will even now conduct the experienced mountaineer from ruin to ruin, and he will be astonished at the directness of the routes which the old dwellers in those remote towers knew and used. Very few of these old towers are now entire. Yet we can picture one of them well enough. The external appearance was that of a solid square mass of masonry-generally the greywacke of the district perforated with holes or boles, which admitted air and light, and also served for defence. This was usually perched on a knoll or eminence-perhaps the top of a scarped rock with a craggy face; the Tweed itself, or one of its tributary waters or burns, flowed near; some birches and hazels, an ash or an elm, dotted the knoll; and on the green braes a few sheep or cattle quietly pastured.

The tower was seldom of more than three storeys. The lowest, or apartment on the ground-floor, was almost universally vaulted; and this was frequently the case with the storey immediately above, forming the hall or diningroom. The ground floor apartment was probably the store-house for the Martinmas mart and winter provisions generally. It might in some cases have been a refuge for the cattle about the tower in times of danger. Occasionally there were two vaulted chambers on the ground-floor, divided by a thick wall, as in the case of the ancient Castlehill of Manor. The second and third storeys accommodated the family, with what comfort

or decency it would be sometimes painful to imagine. There was usually a narrow spiral stair leading to thetop, on which there were projecting battlements—often machicoules-and in the centre of the space there, a kind of crow-gabled cottage, which served both as kitchen. and watch-tower. Here also on the top or roof storey of the peel was the bartisan, the passage round and behind the battlements, which served as a place of outlook, and also as the withdrawing-room for the ladies of the household on a quiet summer afternoon or evening. On the edge of the upper wall or roof, or attached sometimes to the chimney, hung an iron cone sunk in an iron grating,"the fire-pan," filled with fuel, peat and pine-root, ready to be lit at the moment of alarm. The tower had generally two doors-an inside wooden one, studded with iron nails, and an outside iron gate. The moss troopers placed in pledge in the Vale of Jed Water were familiar with the significance of entry within "the irne yetts of Ferniehurst." There was usually a courtyard in front of the tower, surrounded by a wall called the barmkyn, the access to which was through a strong iron gate or studded oaken or ashen door. According to the Act of Parliament, 12th June 1535, the wall of the barmkyn was to be one ell thick, roughly, thirty-seven inches, and six ells in height, that is, over eighteen feet. The space enclosed was sixty feet. Within this the cattle could be driven at night, or in case of a surprise. Every proprietor of a hundred pound land of old extent was to build a barmkyn for the defence of his tenants and their goods, and, if he thought it desirable, he might build a tower for himself within the enclosure. Inside and around the courtyard

enclosed by the barmkyn were the huts or dwellings of the immediate retainers of the family.

The accommodation for a family in these solid pieces of masonry was no doubt limited enough. It must, however, be borne in mind that in the cases of the more considerable families, there was frequently, besides the tower or peel, an ordinary place of residence of a more commodious character. The peel was in these instances. reserved as a place of refuge in times of attack and danger, especially for the females and children of the family. Thus Carey, in his Memoirs, referring to his actings as deputy under Lord Scroope, while English Warden of the Marches, tells us that a Græme, living within five miles of Carlisle, whom he had occasion to attack, "had a pretty house, and close to it a strong tower for his own defence in time of need." When Carey approached the place, and before he could surround the house, "the two Scots [the brother Græmes] were gotten in the strong tower." They were, however, ultimately obliged to open the iron gate of the tower and surrender themselves as prisoners to the deputy.

1

One of the best surviving examples of what must be regarded as at least latterly only a peel of refuge is that of Barns, on the Tweed, about three miles above the town of Peebles. It was probably at one time the residence of the family, but after its possessors, the Burnets, had migrated to a larger house, that stood to the west of it, and is now pulled down, this quaint old keep, with a date of 1498, was preserved as a place of resort in times of alarm and danger.

1 Quoted in Note 48, Lay of the Last Minstrel.

Then several of the more considerable families, who lived in summer in the ancestral tower, had mansionhouses in the neighbouring town, to which they emigrated in winter. Thus, in Peebles, there was the town residence of the Hays of Neidpath, Earls of Tweeddale, and of their successors, the Earls of March-viz., the Dean's House in the High Street, now the Chambers Institution. The ancient lairds of Dawyck had also, up to the Union of the Crowns, and even later, a residence in Peebles, known latterly as "The Pillars," and situated to the north-east of the site of the town cross. Even the Dickiesouns of Winkston and Smithfield, small and poor lairds, and always lawless and aggressive, had, strange to say, a town house in the Cowgate of Edinburgh. It was a quaint and curiously ornate structure, but, alas! I am afraid it has gone down within these few recent years under the spirit of modern improvement, which means. generally the vulgar Philistine intelligence, and is often very far from carrying with it unmitigated blessings.

The internal fittings of these towers were, no doubt, rude enough. The upper or convex part of the vaulted roof of each storey was usually covered with a wooden floor, and, as a precursor of the modern carpet, the boards. were generally strewn with the bent-grass of the moors, or the rushes of the haughs. With these were intermingled sweet-smelling herbs, such as thyme, bed-straw (galium), or fresh-odoured heather. The fragrance of the hillside would thus at least for a time be felt in the narrow and ill-lighted rooms. Glass was rare and costly, and the narrow boles that served for windows were either left wholly open, or they were fitted with a board.