s, and that belongs to the year 1521. On
the eleventh of July of that year an interesting ceremony was gone
through down at Cambuskenneth, on the banks of the Forth. Abbot Mylne,
a man both of culture and character, who to a genuine love of letters
added a love of art and architecture, and who was ultimately the first
President of the Court of Session, had re-built the great altar, the
chapter-house, and part of the cloister of his Abbey, and had laid out
two new cemeteries. In order to signalise these notable additions and
restorations he invited the Bishop of Dunblane to conduct a
consecration and dedication service. The Bishop was directly assisted
in this solemn function by three of his principal clergy--his
archdeacon, George Newton; John Chesholme, prebendary of Kippane; and
"Jacobus Wilson, prebandarius de Glendowane." John Tulydaf, warder of
the Minorites of "Striueling" (Stirling), preached on the efficacy of
dedication after the celebration of the Mass, and amongst those present
were the "noble and powerful" Lord John Erskin, Jacobus Haldene of
Glenegges (Gleneagles), Knight, and various others of the local clergy,
nobility, and gentry, together with a large concourse of people from
the surrounding district. The official account of what took place on
this high day when Glendowane, Glendovan, Glenduen, or Glendevon, first
emerges into the light of history, is duly signed by Jacobus Blakwood,
presbyter of the Diocese of Dunblane, public notary by apostolic
authority, who was on the spot and saw everything properly done.[2] The
name of Prebendary Wilson occurs in several documents both before and
after this, all of which have reference to matters connected either
with Cambuskenneth or Dunblane. He gets prominent mention in a paper
dated from Cambuskenneth, June, 1530, in which he is styled "Canonicus
Dunblanensis," heading a list of "venerable and discreet" gentlemen,
including Alanus Balward, vicar of Kalender, and Andreas Sym, vicar of
Cumry, but we cannot trace him further down than March of the following
year. It is clear from this that Glendevon was attached to the "Kirk
of Dunblane," and that the Parish Church was served from there, not, it
is to be hoped, in the slovenly fashion characteristic of these times,
when the stipend was too often fought for by different teind hunters in
the shape of the bishop of the diocese and the abbot of some
neighbouring monastery, a state of things to which Prebendary