Agnews of Lochnaw

1 330] SOCIAL CONDITION OF WIGTOWNSHIRE. 41
Besides the parish churches of Leswalt, and Kirkcolm, or St.
Columba ; there were, in the neighbourhood of Lochnaw, St.
John's Chapel, on the site of the present castle at Stranraer ;
Chapel Patrick, at Portpatrick — then called the black quarter of
the Inch ; St Mary's Chapel, 1 on the shore of Lochryan, at Sal-
chrie (or Salaquharry, as it was then spelt) ; whilst a chapel also
existed at East Kirkbride or Wellhouse, and another in the lands
of Balsarrock, both in the parish of Kirkcolm, and both of which
have long disappeared. No vestige remains of either building,
nor is there any record of their existence ; though the fact is
handed down by strong tradition, and solitary gravestones
occasionally turned up by the plough mark the spots used as
burying-grounds adjacent to them.
In endeavouring to sketch the aspect of Wigtownshire in
1330, we must not omit a feature now entirely faded from
the scene — the Monk ! In Galloway then, as in Italy at the
present day, the inevitable friar graced every landscape. Of
these there was no lack ; there were friars white and friars grey,
black friars and red, and parti-coloured. Within an easy ride of
Lochnaw stood the priory of Soulseat, inhabited by Augustines,
clothed in white from head to foot. Subject to the spiritual
rule of these as their superiors, there was St. Ninian's famous
convent of Whithorn, more euphoniously called Candida Casa.
At Wigtown dwelt a colony of Black Friars, and the Abbey of
Glenluce belonged to a fraternity of Cistertians, who, if not other-
wise useful, at least were picturesque, their black cowls con-
trasting well with the white habits of their order.
1 This chapel must very soon after have fallen to decay, as we find an Agnew
of Lochnaw renewing a charter of the chapel croft, in 1526, referring to an older
and similar deed ; which croft included the site of Kilmoric or St. Mary's Chapel,
then ruinous.