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

202
COMMENTS ON KEIR PERFOEMANCE,
Fallacy ex-
posed by a
similar mis-
conception
at the out-
set of the
Stewart
pedigree,
here again
illustra-
tive.
^ See liis
Essay on
the Origin
of the
House of
Stewart,
Annals of
Scotland,
edit. 1797,
vol. iii.
pp. 55, 66.
a Ibid.,
p. 57.
ancestor in like manner was started — one " Alden, or Aldan Dapifer " —
whose Christian name, with the usual liberty of former genealogists, was
transmuted into Alan Stewart, and, with a little more fancy and imagina-
tion, into no less than the Stewart of Scotland, son of an asserted Walter
Stewart in the reign of Malcolm III. This was obviously to enhance and
con'oborate, as was deemed by some (after the fashion of the Keir Perform-
ance), the antiquity of the Stewarts, as Stewarts of Scotland.
The same " Aldan Dapifer," like Alexander, son of Patrick de Strivelyn,
figures in tlie testing clauses of two charters, respectively by Earl Gospatrick
and Waldeve, Earl of March, his son (here quoting from Lord Hailes, as we
are always happy to do, who suppUes the particulars in question). To the
" charter by Earl Gospatrick (he says) there are eight witnesses — ' Andrew,
the archdeacon ; Adam, his brother ; Nigel, the chaplain ; Ketel, the son
of Dolphin ; Ernold ; Alden the Stewart (Dapifer) ; Adan, the son of
Alden ; Adan, the son of Gospatrick." And " to the charter granted by
Earl Waldeve, there are nine witnesses ; A Men Dapifer is the seventh in
order. There are only three among them (he adds) who seem to have been
landed gentlemen ; all the three are placed hefoi'e Alden Dapifer."^
Now, upon the first of these two charters Lord Hailes remarks — " Is it
possible for credulity itself to believe that the Alden, placed so low in such
company, was the High Stewai'd of Scotland, a man at least as honourable as
Gospatrick himself ? "
" I have no doubt (he concludes) that the witnesses to this charter were
the dependants or household servants of Earl Gospatrick, and that if we
interpret Nigellus Capellanns to be Nigel, the Earl's chaplain, we must
interpret Alclenus or Aldanus Dapifer to be Alden, the Eaii's steward."
" I persuade myself that Alden Dapifer, and Alan the father of Walter,
Steward of Scotland in the reign of Malcolm IV., were different persons." ^
AVith all submission, then, applying this precedent, which tells in many
respects, and is so mainly illustrative, to our question, we may equally
ask, if not a fortioin, is it possible for credulity itself to believe that the
previous " Alexander, the son of Patrick de Strivehn," not merely following
(like Alden) in the testing clause quoted, an archdeacon, and chaplain,
but also a common churchman, and two obscure and nondescript Besets,
while even the individual last mentioned there — that a man so differently
described, and so postponed to such inferior people, could have been the high