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

WITH DEUMPELLIER'S EXPOSITION, &c. 217
Lockhart — all long since gone and departed ; including, too, it is believed, the
wliole of the dramatis personce in 1818, Sir Samuel Stirling, another
common intimate, though on the opposite side, among the number.
The writer, who must also soon follow, thus remains a forlorn secondary
wreck amidst the loss of such remarkable genius and talent* He was
occupied in these melancholy though pleasurable reflections this very day, 18th
of April 1818, when it so happened he had finished this Exposition, when
all at once it occurred to him, though not thought of before, that it was the
anniversary also of that on which Andrew Stirling, Esq. of DrumpelUer
(father of the present Drumpellier), obtained his signal victory over the
united fofces of Glorat and Keir — the first actually in the field, the other
not, but his determined enemy in secret — by successfully carrying his
service, notwithstanding every possible opposition by them, as heir-male of '
Robert Stirling of Bankeir and Letter, who died in 1537. This was the
main hinge and pivot in the case, while almost immediately thereafter, as a
necessary sequence, he had his status formally and strikingly recognised and
admitted, without even the least challenge of the preceding, who, utterly dis-
comfited, had left the field, or of any remaining party, as nearest heir and re-
presentative of the ancient Stirlings of Cadder. When it is added that those
opposed to him were Mr Robert Jameson, Advocate — a name at our bar
sjseakiug for itself — and who could leave no stone unturned legally to foil an i see Expo-
opponent,' and Mr James Dundas, W.S., at the head, too, of his legal body i22°3.' '''
(both likewise long ago deceased), it must be admitted, without disparagement
to any others, that Drumpellier successfully passed the severest ordeal in his
case that can possibly be figured.
Edinburgh, 18//( April 1860.
* To these also may be added the late penchant of the latter, as in the instance of the
estimable Lord Anderson, snatched away still leading merits of the Drumpellier claim, to
more prematurely ; and with respect to whom, ignore true leading facts, and third parties in
an incident, also in re antiqua, affecting him, a ease, will be found in the Addenda, under
the writer, and the Keir editor withal, in No. IV.
analagous keeping, it may be said, with the
2 E