Page:The castellated and domestic architecture of Scotland from the twelfth to the eighteenth century (1887) - Volume 2.djvu/352

 FOURTH PERIOD 336 BARNES CASTLE be Schir Richart Maitland of Lethingtoun, knycht/' and quoted in the Lamp of Lothian, it is said that " Sir John made a great building at the Barnes, intending that building for a Court, which he did not live to accomplish, and which does not appear to have been completed." The remark that the building was intended for a Court is quite descriptive of a certain stateliness of arrangement,, apparent even in its present ruinous condition. The place has all the appearance of never having been completed. The top of the vaults is entirely covered with vegetation, and nothing whatever of the upper floor can be made out. The two towers on the southern walls are being gradually undermined at the corners by the action of agricultural implements against them when operating in the adjoining field. A little fencing would prevent this, and would be weir expended, as the ruins are worth preserving as a peculiar specimen of Renaissance planning, unlike what is generally seen in the contemporary or previous Scottish houses. BISHOP'S HOUSE, DORNOCH, SUTHERLANDSHIRE. The lay and ecclesiastical edifices of Dornoch, which at one time were extensive, have for long been shorn of their glory, and reduced to very small proportions. The Cathedral, founded in the early part of the thirteenth century by Bishop Gilbert de Moravia, comprised the com- plete arrangement of choir, nave, and transepts, with a square tower over the crossing. Of all these scarcely a vestige remains. In 1570 the Cathedral was burned by the Master of Caithness and Mackay of Strath- navor, and what escaped their ravages was destroyed by a terrific gale in 1605. A portion of the central square tower is probably the only existing remnant of the original church. The transept contains the graves of sixteen representatives of the long line of the Earls of Sutherland, and a monument with an effigy, supposed to be that of Sir Richard de Moravia, the brother of the founder of the See. Opposite the modernised Cathedral stand the scanty ruins of the Bishop's palace or castle. This was also consumed by Caithness and Mackay in 1570, and lay in ruins, till, about the beginning of this century, it was partly fitted up for the county court-house and jail, as Dornoch, although lying at the extreme south-east point of the county, is the capital town of Sutherlandshire. More recently the old buildings were removed to make way for new county buildings, and all that now remains is shown in the sketch (Fig. 785). The lofty tower at the north-west corner has probably formed the keep or place of strength at one angle of a courtyard. The walls seem to be partly of considerable age, but the large windows and the angle bartizans without any continuous parapet round the tower, are clearly of