Biggar and the House of Fleming

600 BIGGAR AND THE HOUSE OF FLEMING.
present is the property of his descendant the Countess of Home.
In this harony is a ruinous building called " the Bower of
Wandell," which, according to tradition, was a hunting seat of
James V. As an old Upper Ward ruin we give the following
representation of it
It stands on a rocky eminence that projects into the river
Clyde almost opposite the village of Roberton, and is connected
by a narrow neck of land with the rising grounds in the
neighbourhood. The position, which it occupies, was well
chosen for defence before the invention of gun-powder, but it
does not seem to have been a building of any great extent or
even strength, and most likely was a tower for the occasional
residence of the Jardines, and, by their permission, may also
at times have been the abode of our Scottish kings, when en-
gaged in rural sports.
THE CHANCELLORS OF SHIELDHILL.
The Chancellors of Shieldhill are the oldest proprietors of land
in the neighbourhood of Biggar. They are supposed to have
come to this country from France at the time of the Norman
Conquest, along with the Sommervilles of Carnwath, whom they
acknowledged as their lords-superior. The alliance between
them and the Sommervilles appears, according to Nisbet, to
have existed at least in 1317, in the time of Robert Bruce.
The oldest of their charters extant, is one that is referred to
in that curious gossiping work, " The Memorie of the Sommer-
villes," and was granted by Thomas Lord Sommerville to
William, or, as Nisbet calls him, George Chancellor of Shield-
hill, in the year 1432. George was succeeded by his son