“ Tho' alt this, no doubt, is mere matter of guess,
Tis certain ere letters were known.
Our fathers recorded great deeds in the way
Which wo see upon this very stone.
" But how died Finella ? ” I ask’d of the sage.
He answer’d—“ Real records are lost;
But tradition hath told that she took her own life
In a deep rocky den near the coast—
That she leapt from the cliffs to a wild boiling pool,
Where her body was torn and tost! *
“ And ’tis written,” he added, “ that proofs were beheld
Of Heaven’s dread vengeance and ire;
That it rained mighty showers, and blew mighty winds,
And the sun and the moon were like fire !
“ That Finella’s fine castle was raz’d to the ground,
And left as is yet to he seen,
A mass of extensive, but unshaply ruins,
On the top of a hillock so green, †
“ But this tragic story thou surely had’st known,
And of our Apostle heard tell;
For many more tales, unsung and unwrote,
Could‘be told of Palladius’ Well ! ”
*****
* Den Finella, a singularly romantic spot, upon the estate of Lanriston, in the parish of St. Cyrus, Kincardineshire, is the supposedscene of Lady Finella’s death.
†Ruins of Greencairn castle, the reputed residence of Lady Finnela are still to be seen upon a knoll, about a mile to the west of the village of FeMercairn. The hill of Strathfinla, or Finella, between Fordoun and Fettercairn, is said to have its name from Lady Finella.
