J. F. Campbell Collection > Popular rhymes of Scotland

88 POPULAR RHYMES OF SCOTLAND.
present Earl of Cassillis (Marquis of Ailsa), and Kennedy
of Barg-eny. The lairds of Girvanraains, Baltersan, Kirk-
michael, Knockdon, Dunure, and Drumellan, were but a
selection of the lesser barons of the name. A memoir of the
family, written about the time of the Revolution, by Mr
William Abercromby, minister of Maybole, after enumerat-
ing- these and other Kennedies of note, says, ' But this name
is under great decay, in comparison of what it was ane age
agoe ; at which time they flourished so in power and num-
ber, as to give occasion to this rhyme : —
'Twixt W'igto^vne and the town of Aire,
And laigh down by the Cruves of Cree,
You shall not get a lodging there,
Except ye court a Kennedy.' *
MOSMAN OF AUCHTYFARDLE.
It is said that the progenitor of this family, at some
period antecedent to his acquisition of the estate, being
applied to by some famished drovers for a fardle or cake of
household bread, presented them with no fewer than eight ;
whereupon, like the witches in Macbeth, they saluted him
in the style of his future dignity, by pronouncing the fol-
lowing punning rhyme upon his beneficence, which is still
well known in Lanarkshire, and especially in the parish of
Lesmahagow : —
Aucht fardle sin' ye gie,
Auchty fardle ye shall be !
The family of Leslie, to which belong two of the Scottish
peerages, traces its origin to Bartholomew, a Flemish chief,
who settled with his followers in the district of Garioch, in
Aberdeenshire, in the reign of William the Lion. He took
the name ' De Lesley' from the place where he settled. The
heralds, however, have an old legend, representing the first
man of the family as having acquired distinction and a
name at once by overcoming a knight in battle at a spot
between a less lee and a greater : —
Between the Less-Lee and the Mair,
He slew the knight, and left him there.
* See Account of the Kennedies, edited by R. Pitcairn, Esq. 4to. Edin-
burgh: 1830.