Comments in refutation of pretensions advanced for the first time, and statements in a recent work "The Stirlings of Keir and their family papers"

90 COMMENTS ON KEIR PERFORMANCE,
most appropriate record for the purpose, out of pure natural affection, with-
Reports, out auj uncluc bias. And accordingly, as has been already shown,^ Lord
Mansfield, in BuUer's Reports, declares, that an " entry in a father's family
mof°]^"^^' Bible, an inscription on a tombstone (certainly not superior to the former), are
all good evidence ; " while he says, too, that " tradition is sufficient in point
of pedigree.""
Now, altogether, the above dicta, and legal postulates, over and above
strikingly concur in the present evidence adduced in favour of the Drum-
pellier-Cadder descent.
It is the autograph attestation in the family Bible of Dr William Stirling,
born in 1682, who had no earthly view to serve at the time, when neither he
nor his family had contemplated legal steps to vindicate their Cadder status
— indeed never questioned till this century, if even now — and who, from his
known religious bias and sentiments, could have attached but little moment
essentially to the fact, though falling to be noticed in this more genealogical
age, and not be overlooked, with family incidents in the Bible, above all
reserved for such reminiscences.
He had the circumstance, too, in his favour, it is believed, of other proof as
to his descent; which, if mistaken, could thus have been easily rectified. The
same gentleman, Dr William Stirling, was twenty-seven when his father, the
,., T .. third John Stirling in the pedigree, died; and that John was no less than
•' See Letter c r o '
°eiue™Pe- gi'^ndson of Walter, son of John Stirling of Lettyr and Bochquharrage (infeft
'iT&t'the' in Auld Keir), whose actual Cadder descent (through Robert liis father, so
E°4o°sition'! often noticed) is in question ; and in the family Bible of the said Dr William,^
together with other autogi-aph notices of births, marriages, and deaths, is the
following express entry : —
"XVIII. JUNII MDCXL.
■■ The exact " Natus fuit patcr mens Joannes Stirling, cujus pater fuit Joannes Stirling,
Lettyr'of fiHus Walteri Stirling, filii Joannis Stirling, qui descenderat ex familia de
stirung, by Cadder " (of coursc iu the male line, according to the usual understanding
which both t-^ i i i t •
Robert and acceptation), " et cuius fuit terra de Balquharragc et terra de Lettu-
Stirling- '■ ' ■' i t i f~i ■ i
rsV?° Stirling prope Duntreth."* The last was clearly and correctly John Stn-hng
ri-natti. alluded to, son of umquhile Robert Stirling of Lettyr, who has been proved
Janet of Gadder's nearest collateral heir.
The above proof is in every view good ; and if mere hearsay, deponed to
from a relative, proved a material fact, as shown in the Airth case in 1839,