Page:The castellated and domestic architecture of Scotland from the twelfth to the eighteenth century (1887) - Volume 2.djvu/360

FOURTH PERIOD 344 EARL PATRICK-S PALACE Messrs. D. and J. Bryce, architects, the idea was abandoned. 1 But while the palace is probably ill adapted for a court-house, it would make a splendid museum or picture gallery. It is such a superb specimen of Scottish seventeenth-century architecture, its oriel windows and turrets not being surpassed by anything of the kind on the mainland, and it is so rich in its details, and spacious in its accommodation, that it is with more than usual regret that one looks on its roofless and decaying walls. FIG. 793. Earl Patrick's Palace. Plan of First Floor. The palace was built by Earl Patrick Stewart (son of Robert Stewart, a natural son of James v.), who obtained possession of Orkney and Shet- land in 1600 ; and during the next fourteen years he ruled these islands in such a despotic and cruel manner as brought him, at the end of that period, to the scaifold. In Fullarton's Gazetteer (edit. 1842) the date above the doorway is said to have been 1607, and from the same authority we learn that it has remained uninhabited since the death of Bishop Mackenzie, who died here in 1688. It is not a little remarkable to find this, which is certainly one of the finest specimens of the Scottish domestic style of architecture, in so remote 1 The plans and geometrical drawings (Figs. 786, 787, 788, 789, and 793) are reduced copies of Messrs. Bryce's drawings, which they have most kindly placed at our disposal.