Greyfriars Church, removed a few years ago to make way for the new front of Marischal College, was a pre-Reformation church, built by Alexander Galloway, Rector of Kinkell, early in the sixteenth century. Its chief features were its range of buttresses and a fine seven-light, traceried window. The Protestant churches that succeeded these ancient buildings were inferior as architecture. It was only in the nineteenth century that taste began to revive and some attempt at grace and embellishment was made. Architects began to study old styles, and this combined with the increasing wealth of the country created a new standard in ecclesiastical requirements. To-day our churches tend to grow in architectural beauty. 19. Architecture—(_b_) Castellated. The earliest fortifications in Scotland were earthen mounds, surrounded with wooden palisades. They were succeeded by stone and lime “keeps” built in imitation of Norman structures. The presence of the Normans in England during the eleventh and twelfth centuries drove the Saxon nobility northwards, and they were followed in turn by other Normans, who obtained possession of great tracts of country. The rectangular keeps of the Normans have in consequence formed the models on which most of the Scottish castles were constructed. In the thirteenth century there were castles at Strathbogie, Fyvie, Inverurie and Kildrummy. These have mostly been rebuilt in recent times and the more ancient parts have disappeared. The general idea in them all was a fortified enclosure usually quadrilateral. The walls of the enclosure were 7 to 9 feet thick and 20 to 30 feet high. The angles had round or square towers, and the walls had parapets and embrasures for defence and a continuous path round the top of the ramparts. The entrance was a wide gate guarded by a portcullis. The comparatively large area within the walls was intended to harbour the population of a district and to give temporary protection to their flocks and possessions in times of danger. Some of the finer examples, such as Kildrummy, closely resemble the splendid military buildings of France in the thirteenth century. One of the towers is usually larger than the others and forms the donjon or place of strength, to which retreat could be made as a last resort, when, during a siege, the enemy had gained a footing within the walls. [Illustration: Kildrummy Castle]