Page:Alloway Kirk or Tam o Shanter a tale and man was made to mourn a poem with a sketch of burnss life.pdf/8

8 gentlemen of Nithsdale, with welcome, with kindness, and even with respect. Their social parties too often seduced him from the duties he owed to his family.

But to return to his native spot, the cottage and Alloway Kirk, for the curiosity of travellers, we shall give a short description of the town of Ayr, where Burns fell in with his first friends, whom he held dear till his death.

We come next to the town of Ayr, the county town, and a presbytery seat, is a royal burgh of great antiquity, erected about 1180, containing about 8000 inhabitants. It is situated upon a point of land, between the influx of the rivers of Ayr and Doon, near its junction with the Atlantic Ocean; the buildings on the banks of the river Ayr, are united by two bridges, which joins with the parishes of Newton and St. Evox, the first contains 1724, and the last 2070 inhabitants. This