Ordnance gazetteer of Scotland > Volume 5

MAE
distingiiislied persons. It was dedicated to the Virgin
Mary, and seems to have been in the First Pointed
style. The chapel was fairly entire in 1739 ; bnt in
1788 a spate of the Avon swept away part of the walls ;
and now it is represented by only the western gable,
thickly clothed with ivv. Edward I. was here in 1301.
—Ord. Sur., sh. 31, 1867.
Mar, an ancient district of SW Aberdeenshire, sub-
divided into Braemar, Midmar, and Croniar. A Mor-
maer of Mar was present at the battle of Clontarff
(1014) ; and Ruadri or Rothri, Mormaer of Mar, figures
in the foundation charter of Scone priory (1115) as
' comes ' or earl. The male line of the Celtic Earls of
Mar expired in 1377 with Thomas, thirteenth Earl, whose
sister, Slargaret, married William, first Earl of Douglas ;
and their daughter, Isabel, in 1404 married Alexander
Stewart, the ' Wolfe of Badenoch,' who, after her death
in 1419, was designated Earl of Mar. The earldom by
rights should have gone to Janet Keith, great-grand-
daughter of the eleventh Celtic Earl, and wife to Sir
Thomas Erskine ; but it was not till 1565 that it was
restored, per modwni justitice, to their sixth descendant,
John, fifth Lord Erskine. Into the present vexed
question of this peerage, it is not possible here to enter;
enough, that there are now two bearers of the title —
Walter Henry Erskine, Earl of Mar and Kellie, whose
seat is Alloa Park ; and Francis Erskine Goodeve-
Erskine, whose seat is Wilton Hall, in Herefordshire.
The former is Earl de facto, according to judgment of
the House of Lords (1875) ; but the latter is Earl de
jure, according to the late Earl of Crawford's Earldom
of Mar in SunsJiine and Shade during Five Hwndred
Years (2 vols., Edinb. 1882).
Mar. See Mar Lodge.
March, Berwickshire. See Meese.
Marchfield. See Gramond.
Marchmont House, a mansion in Polwarth parish,
Berwickshire, f mile SW of Marchmont station on the
Berwickshire loop-line of the North British, this being
3i miles NE of Greenlaw and 3| SW of the post-town
Duns. It is the seat of Sir Hugh Hume-Campbell,
seventh Bart, since 1665 (b. 1812; sue. 1833), who
holds 20,180 acres in the shire, valued at £17,977 per
annum. His father. Sir William Purves, inherited the
property from his great-uncle, the third and last Earl
of Marchmont (1708-94), whose ancestors, the Humes,
possessed the lands of Polwarth for three centuries.
The most famous of them, Sir Patrick Hume (1641-
1724), distinguished as a patriot and statesman, was
created Lord Polwarth in 1690 and Earl of Marchmont
in 1697. (See Harden.) The mansion was built about
1754 by the last Earl to supersede Bedbraes Castle,
situated 200 yards to the E. A semi-Palladian edifice,
from designs by the celebrated Robert Adam, it stands
in a large and finely-wooded park, whose trees, how-
ever, suffered great damage from the gale of 14 Oct.
1881, when the majestic beech avenue, nearly 1 mile
long and 100 yards broad, was wrecked. — Ord. Sur.,
sh."25, 1S65.
Maree, Loch, a magnificent fresh-water lake of Gair-
loch parish, W Ross-shire. Commencing at a point
11§ miles WK"W of Auchnasheen station, and lying 32
feet above sea-level, it extends 12| miles north-west-
ward, with a varying breadth of from 3 furlongs to 2|
miles, a general depth of 360 feet, and an area of 11
square miles or 7090| acres. On all sides it is over-
looked by mountains of great height and beautiful
contour, so that its shores present an inexhaustible
variety of the most romantic and interesting scenery.
The loftiest are Ben" Sleoch (3217 feet) to the NE, and
Ben Eay or Eighe (3309) to the SW. From the
former of these the Lewis, with the town and bay of
Stornoway, can be distinctly seen. The effect of this
superb mountain, seen at once from its base to its
summit, is, perhaps, more striking than that of any
other mountain in the Highlands. At the western
extremity, Ben Lair (2817 feet) is a principal feature
in the landscape — graceful, solid, broad ; and where its
skirts descend steep into the water, the scenes are
6
MAEKINCH
peculiarly original and grand. The northern margin of
Loch Maree presents a great variety of scenery, consist-
ing of rocky and wooded bays, and creeks rising into
noble overhanging cliffs and mountains ; here also are
displayed some of the finest general views of the lake.
But there is one portion of the margin of the lake so
peculiar as to deserve the most minute description, and
that of Dr M'CuUoch is so vivid and so true, that we
cannot refrain from extracting it : 'In one place in
particular, the remains of a fir forest, in a situation
almost incredible, produce a style of landscape that
might be expected in the Alps, but not among the more
confined scope and tamer arrangements ot Scottish
mountains. Immediately from the water's edge, a
lofty range of gray cliffs rise to a great height, so steep
as almost to seem perpendicular, but varied by fissures
and by projections covered with grass and wild plants.
Wherever it is possible for a tree to take root, there firs
of ancient and noble growth, and of the most wild and
beautiful forms, are seen rising above each other, so
that the top of one often covers the root of the succeed-
ing, or else is thrown out horizontally in various fan-
tastic and picturesque modes. Now and then some
one more wild and strange than the others, or some
shivered trunk or fallen tree, serves to vary the aspect
of this strange forest, marking also the lapse of ages,
and the force of the winter storms which they have so
long braved.'
■The bosom of Loch Maree is gemmed with islands of
varied size and appearance. They are 27 in number,
and lie chiefly in a cluster on the middle of the lake,
w'here it is broadest. The chief of these, all noticed
separately, are Ellan-Subhainn, Ellan-JIaree, and
Ellan-Rokymore or Ruaiiidh-Mor. The lake is sup-
posed at one time to have had a much lower level than
it now has, and to have been raised to its present level
by the accumulation of sand and gravel at the lower
end, by which the water was dammed in. Indeed
there is reason to think, that Lochs Maree and Ewe
originally formed one lake, under the name of Loch
Ewe, as the village near the head of Loch Maree is
named Kinlochewe or ' li ead of Loch Ewe. ' Loch Maree
contains salmon, sea-trout, yellow trout, and char,
though the first are very seldom caught ; and the river
Ewe, flowing from it, is almost the best angling water
on the W coast of Scotland, abounding with salmon of
princely size and quality. A steamer was launched on
the lake in 1883. The Talladale or Lochmaree Hotel,
on the SW shore of the lake, opposite the group of
islands, and 9 miles NW of Kinlochewe, is an excellent
establishment, erected in 1S72, and honoured from the
12th to the 18th of September 1877 by a visit from
Queen Victoria and the Princess Beatrice. A rock of
pale red granite bears a Gaelic inscription recording
this visit, which is fully described in More Leaves from
the Journal of a Life in the Highlands (1884). There
is a post and telegraph office of Lochmaree under Ding-
wall.— Oi-d Sur., shs. 92, 91, 1881-82.
Margaretsfield, a village in Euthwell parish, Dum-
friesshire, 8 miles W by N of Annan.
Markinch [inarTc-inch, ' the forest island '), a small
town and a parish in the Kirkcaldy district of Fife.
The town has a station (the junction for Leslie) on the
Edinburgh, Perth, and Dundee section of the North
British, 22i miles N by E of Edinburgh, 11* SSW
of Cupar, "ih. N by E of Kirkcaldy, and 4J E of
Leslie. It is built on the top and sides of a low
ridge, which, according to tradition, was once an
island in a lake. This is supposed to explain the
derivation of the name Markinch. The height of this
ridge is greater at its northern and southern ex-
tremities than at the centre. The northern was at
one time occupied by a Culdee cell ; and the southern,
known as Markinch Hill, has six terraces, each
20 feet broad, and rising one above the other, cut out
from it. By some, these terraces have been ascribed
to the Romans, while others have thought it probable
hat th ey were intended for an amphitheatre, from which
games, etc., engaged in below, might easily be viewed.