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He was shown into the blue-and-white room, and there, after business had been transacted, very nervously on Miss Ailie's part, she offered him his choice between ginger wine and what she falteringly called wh-wh-whiskey. He partook in the polite national manner, which is thus: "You will take something, Mr. Cortachy?" "No, I thank you, ma'am." "A little ginger wine?" "It agrees ill with me."
On Magnus' death in 1239, Gillebryd or Gillebride, called in the Icelandic Annals Gibbon, who was either a son or younger brother of Magnus, succeeded Magnus II in the Orkney and Caithness titles and in the Paul share of the Caithness earldom, and it appears from a grant of the advowson of Cortachy on 12th December 1257 that Matilda daughter of Gillebert, "then late Earl of Orkney," married Malise Earl of Stratherne.
The motive for the haunting is akin to that in the tale of the Scotch "Drummer of Cortachy," where the spirit of the murdered man haunts the family out of revenge, and appears before a death. Mr. T.J. Westropp, M.A., has furnished the following story: "My maternal grandmother heard the following tradition from her mother, one of the Miss Ross-Lewins, who witnessed the occurrence. Their father, Mr.
"Miss D., a relative of the present Lady C., who had been staying some time with the Earl and Countess at their seat, near Dundee, was invited to spend a few days at Cortachy Castle, with the Earl and Countess of Airlie.
Porter infinite amusement, and one of these adventures, in particular, he told me, was as fresh in his mind as if it had happened yesterday. "Looking back upon it now," he said, with a far-away look in his eyes, "it certainly was a strange coincidence, and if you are interested in the hauntings of Cortachy, Mr.
Possessing such an heirloom myself, I can therefore readily sympathise with those who own a similar treasure such, for example, as the famous, or rather infamous, Drummer of Cortachy Castle, who is invariably heard beating a tattoo before the death of a member of the clan of Ogilvie. Mrs. Crowe, in her Night Side of Nature, referring to the haunting, says:
"Miss D. was naturally much concerned, and indeed not a little frightened at this explanation, and her alarm being augmented by hearing the sounds on the following day, she took her departure from Cortachy Castle, and returned to Lord C.'s, where she related this strange circumstance to the family, through whom the information reached me.
O'Donnell, you may, perhaps, like to hear the account of my ghostly experiences in that neighbourhood." Of course I replied that nothing would give me greater pleasure, and Mr. Porter forthwith began his story. "One misty night in October, my friend Alec and I, both being keen on rabbiting, determined to visit a spinney adjoining the Cortachy estate, in pursuit of our quarry.
"Some historians have, of course, declared that Setoun was murdered at Mains Castle, and others declare Cortachy to have been the scene of the assassination; but the truth that it occurred at Glencardine is proved by a quantity of the family papers which, when your father purchased Glencardine, came into his possession. You ought to search through them." "I will.
At Cortachy he was quite secure, as long as no English soldiery came by, and even if they did, the mountains were full of hiding places, and there was no risk of treachery at home. Two officers who had served in the French army, Brown and Gordon by name, had sought refuge here before him, and lay concealed in the house of a peasant known as Samuel.
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