History and traditions of the land of the Lindsays in Angus and Mearns

GLENESK — OLD KIKKYAED. 71
first of these was erected in 1751, to the memory of a youth,
who perished amongst a quantity of heather which accidentally
took fire around him ; and, it will be perceived, that the conclu-
sions drawn from the melancholy circumstance are fully as quaint
in conception as in expression : —
" From what befalls us here below,
Let none from thence conclude,
Our lot shall aftertime be so —
The young man's life was good.
Yet, heavenly wisdom thought it fit,
In its all sovereign way,
The flames to kill him to permit,
And so to close his day."
The next was written on Mr. Charles Garden of Bellastreen,
in Aboyne, a relative of the family of Garden of Troup, who were
tacksmen or factors for the Pamnure and Southesk portions of the
forfeited estates. This gentleman, who appears from his motto
to have been everything that could be wished, died at the patri-
archal age of ninety in 1761, and the epitaph is decidedly the
best specimen of the author's powers in this way with which we
have met : —
" Entomb'd here lies what's mortal of the man,
Who fill'd with honour Life's extended span ;
Of stature handsome, front erect and fair,
Of dauntless brow, yet mild and debonair.
The camp engaged his youth, and would his age,
Had cares domestic not recall'd his stage,
By claim of blood, to represent a line,
That but for him was ready to decline.
He was the Husband, Father, Neighbour, Friend,
And all their special properties sustained.
Of prudent conduct, and of morals sound,
And who, at last, with leugth of days was crown'd."
The other, which is ascribed to Ross, and bearing the same
date as Mr. Garden's, is altogether so unworthy of his mind, and
unlike his style of composition, that we forbear giving it, being
convinced that it is the work of another and worthless rhymester.
These two epitaphs now cited, with that written on the death of
his wife, are, so far as we know, the amount of Ross' work in
that line, though - we cannot help thinking that Garden's epitaph