History of the Johnstones, 1191-1909, with ... - Electric Scotland

CHAPTER X.
Younger Sons of Johnstoun after the Union—Clergy—Medicine—Merchants
—Westraw—The Laird—Corrie—Wamfray—Newbie— In Edinburgh—Attack
on Newbie Tower—The Estate Passes to the Laird of Johnstoun— His
Murder — Barbara Johnstoun Tried for "Papistry" — Her Daughters—
A Romantic Marriage— Robert of Raecleuch—The Earl of Wigton.
THE
cruel destructiveness with which the English and civil wars had been
carried on in Mid-Annandale, the sequestration of Johnstoun's estates,
and the hostility of the Maxwells, who with their allies owned Galloway
and half Dumfriesshire, were gradually driving the Johnstoun chiefs south-
ward ;
and after Dryfe Sands their head took up his abode at Cove or Dunskellie,
near Graitney. His father began the movement by renting lands at Kelhead,
between Cummertrees and Annan, from his sister Jean, the widow of the Master
of Carlile, and remarried to Lord Seton. It was the weaker clan concentrating
its forces. Even the sons of Johnstoun of Reidhall, outlawed for over twentyfour
years, found shelter in Graitney, though the penalty was death to all who
harboured criminals.
There was a want of occupation for younger sons after 1603. The regular
army did not exist ; and a limited number of professional men could gain a living
in so poor a country. Some went to join the Prince of Orange, others to help
to found a new Empire in America. We had then no footing in India.
Speed and Monypeny, in the sixteenth century, speak of the Scottish
zeal for learning ; and those who entered the professions were called Sir,
a translation of Dominus, when they graduated at a university. In 1492
and 1575 Sir James Weild and Sir Cuthbert Rig, both writers, were so called
in Dumfries ; in Annandale Sir John and Sir James Johnstoun were successively
priests at Dornock ; Sir Edward Johnstoun, a priest at Moffat ; Sir
Thomas Johnstoun, chaplain at Stirling in 1 544 ; and the Abbots of Salsit, always
Johnstouns, were known by the same prefix—but not the lay-parsons and layabbots.
The custom died out when the two kingdoms were united, and Master
or Mr substituted ; but landowners always preferred to go by the name of their
estate.
The early physicians were called Right Hon., but they had to go to France
or Italy to study. Buchanan tells us that the lairds were commonly taught