Blair Collection > Book of Common Order, commonly called John Knox's Liturgy

NOTICES OF BISHOP CARSWELL.
In the parish of Kilmartin, in Argyllshire, in a
narrow, richly wooded Highland glen, and within a
few miles of the south end of Loch Awe, lies the old
castle of Camassery. The castle appears to have been
a stronghold of the family of Argyll, and had, as usual
in such cases, its constable, who governed it in the
name of the owner. In the early part of the sixteenth
century this office was held by a family of the name
of Carswell. Whence they had come does not appear,
but the name is not a Celtic one, and the probability
is that, like the Chisholms of the north, who came
from Tweeddale, and became constables of the castle
of Urquhart, the Carswells came from the Lowlands,
and were appointed by the family of Argyll constables
of Camassery. John Carswell, the author of the follow-
ing translation, appears to have been born about the year
1520. This is inferred from an entry in the record of
the University of St. Andrews, to the effect that, in 1541,
John Carswell, a native of Britain, was enrolled in the
College of St. Salvator. 1 Allowing him to have been
1 Wudruw Collections, p. 471.