ncairn.
It was bought in 1611 by Stephen Laurie, the founder of the Laurie
family. Stephen was a Dumfries merchant. The castle was a turreted
building. In it Annie Laurie was born.

[Illustration: ANNIE LAURIE.

From a painting now preserved at Maxwelton House.]

This castle was partially burned in the last century, but not all of
it. The great tower is incorporated in the new house, and also a
considerable portion of the old walls was built in. The foundations
are those of the castle. The picture shows the double windows of the
tower. In places its walls are twelve feet thick. The lower room is
the "gun-room," and the little room above, that in the next story, is
always spoken of in the family as "Annie Laurie's room," or "boudoir."
This room of Annie's has been opened into the drawing-room by taking
down the wall, and it forms a charming alcove. Its stone ceiling shows
its great age.

In the dining-room, a fine, large apartment, we come again upon the
old walls, six feet thick, which gives very deep window recesses. In
this room hang the portraits of Annie Laurie and her husband,
Alexander Ferguson. They are half-lengths, life-size.

Annie's hair is dark brown, and she has full dark eyes--it is
difficult to say whether brown or deep hazel. I incline to the latter.
Whoever doctored the second verse of the original song--I heard it
credited to "Mrs. Grundy" by a grandnephew of Burns--whoever it was,
he had apparently no knowledge of this portrait, for you all know he
has given Annie a "dark _blue_ e'e."

[Illustration: Alexander Ferguson, Annie Laurie's husband. From a
painting now preserved at Maxwelton House.]

The nose is long and straight; the under lip full, as though "some bee
had stung it newly," like that of Suckling's bride. A true Scotch
face, of a type to be met any day in Edinburgh, or any other Scotch
town. She is in evening dress of white satin, and she wears no jewels
but the pearls in her hair.

Alexander Ferguson, the husband of Annie Laurie, has a handsome,
youthful face, with dark eyes and curling hair. His coat is brown, and
his waistcoat blue, embroidered with gold, and he wears abundant lace
in the charming old fashion.

It was at Maxwelton House, Annie's birthplace, that I came across the
missing link in the chain of evidence that fixes the authorship of the
song upon Douglas of Fingland. Fingland is in the parish of Dalry, in
the adjacent shire of Kirkcudbright, and Douglas was a some