famous attack, and that down to 1835 the minister of the
parish received an annual grant of five, and sometimes ten shillings,
for grass destroyed at the Sacrament; while a handy parishioner also
drew five shillings per annum for putting up the Communion tent on the
glebe, and a little extra now and then for making a road to it.[27] It
is impossible to say if Burns when at Harvieston was ever actually in
Glendevon, but about thirty years later the home of the Taits, which
the poet found so pleasant, is brought into close connection with the
parish owing to an incident which had its own share in giving to the
Church of England one of its wisest, if not one of its greatest,
primates. It was in Glendevon House that young Archibald Campbell
Tait, according to his own statement, which was found in his desk after
his death, written on a sheet of foolscap, had an experience which he
never forgot. His words are--"I had ridden over with my brother
Crawfurd from Harvieston to Glendevon to visit old Miss Rutherford, and
stayed the night in her house. I distinctly remember in the middle of
the night awaking with a deep impression on my mind of the reality and
nearness of the world unseen, _such as through God's mercy has never
left me_."[28] And with this fragment of spiritual history our local
record comes to a close. If the parish of Glendevon, nestling, like
Burns' Peggy, "where braving angry winter's storm the lofty Ochils
rise," and its clear winding river, occupy but a lowly place in
Scottish story, they have something better even than archaeological
treasures and stirring memories--the abiding presence of that spirit of
beauty, which is above all change, and which ever haunts

"The green valleys
Where Devon, sweet Devon, meandering flows."

[1] Much of the legendary history of the Devon is given in the
extraordinary poem "Glenochel," by Mr James Kennedy.

[2] See _Registrum Monasterii S. Marie De Cambuskenneth_, A.D.
1147-1535. Edinburgi: 1872; p. 122.

[3] _History of the Reformation_, Vol. I., p. 233.

[4] The parish was served by readers from 1568 to 1586, when the reader
Symon Pawtoun was presented to the living, and, curiously enough, his
successor, A. Marschell, after being minister for a year, was forced by
the Presbytery to accept the lower position.

[5] See _The Darker Superstitions of Scotland_. By John Graham
Dalyell. Glasgow: 1835; p. 579.

[6] Mr Wood Martin in his learned work, _P