Hence, just when success was about to crown their efforts,
the horses made a violent plunge forward--and the chain parted at a
weak link! No further attempts to ascertain the exact bearings of that
box have ever been successful. It is, as of old, at the bottom of the
lough--at least so says tradition.
And Sewingshields Castle is now no longer a castle; its very vaults and
its walls have disappeared.
"No towers are seen
On the wild heath, but those that Fancy builds,
And save a fosse that tracks the moor with green,
Is nought remains to tell of what may there have been."
THE KIDNAPPING OF LORD DURIE
"It is commonly reported that some party, in a considerable action
before the Session, finding that Lord Durie could not be persuaded to
think his plea good, fell upon a stratagem to prevent the influence and
weight which his lordship might have to his prejudice, by causing some
strong masked men to kidnap him, in the Links of Leith, at his diversion
on a Saturday afternoon, and transport him to some blind and obscure
room in the country, where he was detained captive, without the benefit
of daylight, a matter of three months (though otherwise civilly and well
entertained); during which time his lady and children went in mourning
for him as dead.
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