"Easy is my bed—it is easy,
But it is not to sleep that I incline.
The wind whistles northwards, northwards,
And my thoughts move with it.
More pleasant were it to be with thee
In the little glen of calves
Than to be counting of droves
In the enclosures of Crieff."
Mention of the name of Robert Doun brings up recollections of another literary name—that of David Mallet, or Malloch, who is said to have been born in Crieff. He has the honour of being mentioned several times in Boswell's Life of Johnson. The latter had no great respect for him, though, perhaps, he did not mean all he said in his famous criticism of Lord Bolingbroke's philosophy, which Mallet published after the author's death. "Sir, he was a scoundrel and a coward—a scoundrel, for charging a blunderbuss against religion and morality; a coward, because he had no resolution to fire it off himself, but left half-a-crown to a beggarly Scotchman to fire it off after his death." It has been disputed whether Mallet, or Thomson of the "Seasons," wrote "Rule Britannia." I do not care to enter into it. After all, David Mallet was a lesser light in the literary firmament. It more concerns the literary honour of Crieff that John Cunningham, the historian of the Church of Scotland, did his life-work here; and that in the year 1793, Rachel Barlas, daughter of the Secession minister of Crieff, went to Comrie as wife of Samuel Gilfillan and became the mother of George Gilfillan, late of Dundee, a man of fine gifts and of glowing imagination—somewhat loosely controlled, who wrote much—too much; but unfortunately left nothing worthy of the reputation he had among his intimates.
[1] Vicars of Crieff at an earlier date were Bricius, who was a witness to the reconciliation of Earl Robert and Innocent, Abbot of Inchaffray, in the Church of Strogeth. The entry is—"Bricio persona de Creffe, et Malisio filio ejus," showing that celibacy was not the universal clerical custom; and Nicholas, who in one charter, of date 1258, is called "Camerario Comitis" (Malise); and in another, "Meo filio," by "Malisius filius Gilberti quondam Comitis de Stratherne." Hence he was a cousin of the Malise to whom he was "camerarius."
APPENDIX
[Transcriber's notes:
Several entries in this appendix refer to page numbers elsewhere in this book. Those page numbers are indicated by numbers enclosed in curly braces, e.g. {99}. They have been located where page breaks occurred in the original book, in accordance with Project Gutenberg's FAQ-V-99. In the HTML version of this book, page numbers are placed in the left margin.
In a number of the date ranges below, blank spaces represented missing dates. In this etext, to preserve formatting, missing dates are represented with question marks.]
ROLL OF MINISTERS WITHIN THE PRESBYTERY OF AUCHTERARDER
FROM THE REFORMATION TO THE PRESENT TIME
By Rev. GEORGE D. MACNAUGHTAN, B.D., Ardoch
ARDOCH
(Chapel opened for Worship, 25th March, 1781.)