Page:The castellated and domestic architecture of Scotland from the twelfth to the eighteenth century (1887) - Volume 2.djvu/169

MACLELLAN'S HOUSE - 153 FOURTH PERIOD room is situated over the hall, and is of the same size,, having access by two of the wheel staircases. The apartments reached by the stair entering off the window in the deep recess in the great hall seem to have been the private chambers of the lord and lady of the house and their family, and the other portions of the house may have been reserved for guests and domestics. There were altogether eighteen or twenty rooms. Over the entrance door there is a large and ornamental panel, divided into three compartments, of which a sketch is given (Fig. 6 12). In the lower compartment are the arms of Sir Thomas Maclellan and his wife, Dame G. Maxwell, and in one of the compartments, above the shield, are the letters C. M., 1582, the date of erection, and beneath the shield can be made out the letters DOMS DEBIT THE HOWS OF HEFP The window to the right of the panel in the sketch (Fig. 612), and also seen in the view from the north-east (Fig. 609), is in a somewhat similar style, and is ornamented with the revived dog-tooth enrichment, so characteristic of this period. The other window, with parapet above, is from the northmost of the two projections in the re-entering angle. The builder of this house was Sir Thomas Maclellan of Bombie. He was of a family once prominent in the neighbourhood, but not now repre- sented in the locality. The house stands on the site of the convent of Greyfriars, which, being in ruins, was in 1569 granted to Sir Thomas, and, as we see by the date over the doorway, it was twelve years later before the building was in progress. It is said by local authorities that only a few of the rooms were ever completely finished, or rendered fit for habitation, and that it has been roofless since 1752. Sir Thomas was Provost of Kirkcudbright, and died in 1597. Immediately adjoining the house, to the south-east, is a small aisle and transept, now used as a school, containing a monument to Sir Thomas and his wife. This building formed a part of the old church, taken down during this century, and, being on the site of the Grey- friars monastery, it is quite possible that part of the old buildings may be incorporated in its walls, although the main structure is evidently of a far later age. The monument is shown in Fig. 6 13. The semicircular arch with its quasi-Gothic mouldings, and dog-tooth enrichments, have been fre- quently mistaken for old arch stones belonging to the monastery ; but they are not so. The whole monument is of one period, and shows in all its details the mixture of Gothic and Classic forms so prevalent at