MORE OF GLAMIS

Wanganui Chronicle, Volume 75, Issue 13, 16 January 1932, Page 13 (Supplement)

MORE OF GLAMIS

DUNCAN’S MURDER (By T.C.L.) There is a secret chamber in Glamis Castle, the entrance to which is known to only three persons, the Earl, his heir, and any third person they may take into their confidence. In this chamber tradition says that there died in 1454 the fourth Earl of Crawford, after a hasty vow that he would play dice until the day of judgment. There is also a secret staircase, discovered only 40 years ago. In one of the dungeons—all the Scottish castles have their dungeons, and awful places they are—was a well from which in time of siege . the garrison obtained its water supplies. The windlass w*as still there, and a piece of lighted paper thrown down the well seemed to take an interminable time to reach the bottom, so deep is it. The party were shown some of Ihe relics of the castle. There was a pair of boots belonging to Prince Charles, and a leather jacket worn by Claverhouse when he was killed. There is a fine painting of Claverhousc in the drawing room, also paintings of James VI., Charles I. and Charles 11. and other personages, showing the royalist sympathies of the Strathmore family. The party passed through what is called the King’s room, a* vaulted chamber garnished with stags’ heads, a boar’s head, and similar trophies oc the chase and said by tradition to be the spot of Duncan’s murder by Macbeth, dramatised by Shakespeare in his immortal play, “Macbeth”— Methought I heard a voice cry "Sleep no Macbeth does murder sleep”—the innocent Sleep that knits up the ravell’d slave of The death of each day’s life, sore labour’s bath. Balm of hurt minds, great nature’s second course. Chief nourisher in life’s feast .... Glamis hath murder’d sleep, and therefore Cawdor Shall sleep no more: Macbeth shall sleep no more. Lady Maebcth, scheming, callous, ambitious, waits, with tense nerves. lie is about it: the doors are open, and the surfeited grooms do mock their charge with snores. . . Hark! I laid their daggers ready; he could not miss ’em. Had he not resembled my father as he slept, I had done ’t.’ . . Macbeth staggers in: “I have done the deed. Didst thou not hear a noise!” “Onlv the owl scream and the cricket’s cry.” The scene for such a foul deed, based on Malcolm’s apochryphal death, could not be set in conditions more eerie or gloomy. The very atmosphere seemed to bo charged with preternatural spirits. Only the appearance of the ethereal figures from the recesses of time was required to complete the re-enactment of the bloody, tragic scene so graphically depicted by the immortal bard. The history of the Strathmores is bound up with that of Scotland. The first of the family to come into prominence was Sir John de Lyon, who in the middle of the 14th century married Lady Jean Stewart, youngest daughter of King Robert 11. He was subsequently ambassador to England, and gave his son and grandson as hostages when James I. was released from his captivity in England. He is said to have died in a duel with his neighbour Lindsay, from whom the Earls of Crawford are descended He was buried in the. Royal burying ground at Scone, and his grandson became the first Lord Glamis.

Three sons of the third Lord Glamis fell at Flodden. The eighth, Chancellor of Scotland from 1575 to 1578, was killed during a skirmish with the Lindsays, and the ninth, the first to be made an Earl, was captain of the guard of King James VI. of Scotland and I. of England. The second Earl was an ardent Covenanter, but his grandson entertained the young Chevalier and nearly lost his head as well as his

The sixth was killed in a brawl at Forfar, and a son of the ninth Earl, in the service of the East India Company, was murdered at Patua by the order of the nabob.

The most, riagie story of the family history is that of Lady Janet Douglas, wife of sixth Lord Glamis. Condemned for treason against James V., she was burned at the stake on the Castlehill of Edinburgh.

! The Lairds of Strathmore have been noted for shrewd and generous manave- ! ment of the estates and for eneourageI ment given to agriculture. Their tenI ants include some of the most skilful 1 and prosperous farmers in Scotland, for ; the broad fertile Strath produces ’ crops and herds of the highest standard. In fact, all the soil of arable I Scotland is intensely tilled, unlike that of England which. to-day has less areas in cultivation than 50 years ago. The hardy and industrious Scots have to contend against a harsh and uncertain climate, and in some summers they see their labours lost by the continuous

The Press party were informed that the rent roll of Glamis was about £BO,OOO a year, whilst the rates and taxes amounted to nearly £120,000. Against this, however, hail to be’ set the amount of rates to be recovered under the recently enacted Derating Aet. One member of the party asked hoy long could the estates be kept going under such a heavy load of taxation. “How long can a dog live on its own tail?” quickly came the reply.

Rural land is no longer an asset in the United Kingdom to-day. On the contrary, it is a liability, and it is not surprising to learn that the Earl of Strathmore is considering parting with his heritage. Probably it will go. as so many other historical estates have gone, to affluent Americans. The country and the people are the poorer by the change of ownership and the disappearance of the old land barons. T .ord Strathmore mentions that taxation is absorbing £BO out of every £lOO he receives. He is not singular in his experience. Members of the Press Conference were told by several land-hold-ers that they were paying in taxation in various forms no less than 18s fid in the pound, and could see. no early prospect of relief. They are paying not only for the war but to maintain a

huge and ever growing army of unemployed. The visitor is led to wonder what is going to be the ultimate economic effect upon the nation when its backbone disappear-, and there is left no t xable assets. That is a condition which seems to be within measurable distance. The Socialist, by constitutional means, is achieving his purpose just as effectively as if he were em-

I ploying more direct and unconstitutional methods: he is confiscating pro- : I perty and distributing it amongst nonproperty holders. The tragic part of it is that it is doing the latter no permanent good, but on the contrary doing them very considerable harm, for it is taking away from them the desire to work, and their ambition, and their very self-respect.