Liquour

During the seventeenth and eighteenth centuries a great amount of illicit distillation took place. After these practices were finally put down by the interference of ducal authority, numerous stories of adventure and risk continued to be told for many years. A very fine specimen of the "wee still" was unearthed while some land was being reclaimed about one hundred yards from the present curling pond. There was a large cup-shaped hole with the remains of staves in it. A few yards further up the burn, there were four iron furnace-bars and a few bricks; just below these a large heap of wood ashes deeply covered with soil. The chimney was formed of planks, and rose slowly underground in the face of the bank for about thirty yards ending in a clump of whins in order to disperse the smoke where it found vent. The utensils required for manufacture had all been removed.

A man who might have been interested in this as a going concern, seeing that he lived within a mile of it, in his old age told the story of a narrow escape. On a day when he had a large jar of spirits, on which duty had not been paid, in his house and another buried outside, he got information that Revenue Officers were making for his house. There was not time to bury or remove the jar. His wife was resourceful and at once placed her largest tub with the jar inside, opposite the cottage door, piling upon it a large quantity of clothes steeped and ready for washing. The officers made a thorough search of the house and garden but passed by the tub as a matter of course without taking any notice of it.