[Illustration: OLD BELFRY, KIPPEN]
As usual in Scotland, the village contained two churches--the Parish
Church and the United Free Church. In the old churchyard was an ancient
ivy-covered belfry, but the church to which it belonged had long since
disappeared. Here was the burial-place of the family of Edinbellie, and
here lived in olden times an attractive and wealthy young lady named
Jean Kay, whom Rob Roy, the youngest son of Rob Roy Macgregor, desired
to marry. She would not accept him, so leaving Balquidder, the home of
the Macgregors, accompanied by his three brothers and five other men, he
went to Edinbellie and carried her off to Rowardennan, where a sham form
of marriage was gone through. But the romantic lover paid dearly for his
exploit, as it was for robbing this family of their daughter that Rob
forfeited his life on the scaffold at Edinburgh on February 16th, 1754,
Jean Kay having died at Glasgow on October 4th, 1751.
[Illustration: QUEEN MARY'S BOWER, INCHMAHOME.]
We were well provided for at the "Cross Keys," and heard a lot about
Mary Queen of Scots, as we were now approaching a district where much of
the history of Scotland was made.
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