Kings of Carrick

SLAIN IN THE WOOD OF ST. LEONARD'S. 51
as he had known it ever since he was a boy ; and the vener-
able trees of the field and of the forest were putting on the
very same hues they had always done at the season, ever
since he could remember. Maybole, too, was the same as ever.
In its college churchyard lay slumbering whole generations of
Kennedys ; and the walls of the Castle loomed up against the
sky, the one prominent feature of the High Street.
Sir Thomas Kennedy was in high spirits, and as he rode
along he chatted familiarly to his servant, Lancelot Kennedy,
an humble member of the family — far-removed, but still a
Kennedy.
Leaving Maybole and its castle behind, he again turned to-
wards the coast and rode towards Greenan, one of the strong-
holds of theEarl of Cassillis, standing on the verge of an eighty
or ninety feet high sheer precipice, about three miles to the
south of the town of Ayr. Greenan could not boast of its
architecture. A small square tower, and a " wing," to land-
ward, was all it possessed ; but, if it had no pretensions to
magnitude, it occupied a site whose suitability for the times
could not be denied. The door opened on the very edge of
the cliff, which was only, at its extreme point, large enough to
hold the castle. On three sides it was impregnable, and only
required defence on the eastern, or land-ward approach.
Whether from the nature of its position, or from the fact that,
as compared with other fortalices of the Kennedys it was
relatively unimportant, Greenan was never subjected to
assault, and it stood looking over a fair vast stretch of country
untouched, but commanding in aspect.
If the Laird of Baltersan, who held the castle for the Earl
of Cassillis, could not boast of his plain, rugged peel, he might
at least, had he so minded, have boasted of the prospect
which it commanded. Not only, as at Culzean, was the
estuary of the Clyde with rts attendant majesties within his
ken ; in addition, he overlooked the lower stretches of the
Doon, and saw it winding its way mid sand and shingle to