Salt-foot controversy

ItEPLY TO CANDIDUS. 33
Zester in Auchtermuir ;" — and to the lands of
wester Daldiie, belonging to the Bishop of Glasgow,
in which Gawin is to be rentalled, and not in-
feft :* The former, the ancient estate of Allan ton,
which, according to Candidus, was bestowed in full
property, by the Church, upon their immediate
vassal, Sir Allan Stewart of Daldiie [whose father
was " second cousin to Robert the Second"] in the
year 1420, in reward of his military services ! The
other, upon the same authority, that still more
venerable possession, or " barony? as it is called,
" upon the Clyde" near Glasgow, that Sir Robert
Stewart, the 'progenitor " certainly" of one of the
most ancient branches of the House of Stewart"
had obtained " in patrimony" from his father, Sir
John Stewart of Bonkill, killed at Falkirk in the
year 1298, to whom it is thus alleged originally to
small, and the miserable steadings (the old phrase for a farm-
house and offices) denoted the poverty of the tenants. " P.
Alloa Clackmann, Stat. Ace. viii. 603. )" — I am exilit fra my
takkis and fra my steddingis. " Compl. S. p. 191." Jamieson.
* The term " rental" is abundantly known. Farmers, in these
days, were for the most part stationary upon the grounds of their
landlord, and hence sometimes came to be styled native rentallers.
I admit, that, as now, it was at this period expedient, occa-
sionally, even for absolute proprietors, to rentall, or take in
lease, some necessary portion of the territory of their neighbours j
but it is extremely obvious, that, without a certain quantity of
land feudally held, none then could be admitted into the ranks of
gentry, or possess the smallest political consideration in the coun-
try. The speculations of Candidus upon the term fewar are now
utterly irrelevant.
C