One day, Kennedy and his two sons left their house in the Castle Hill of Edinburgh, to go to the usual place of rendezvous at the Cross, when, passing along the Luckenbooths, he was accosted by Mr Houston with violent language, referring to the late legal proceedings. Kennedy, if his own account is to be trusted, gave no hard language in return, but made an effort to disengage himself from the unseemly scene, and moved on towards the Cross. Houston, however, followed and renewed the brawl, when it would appear that Gilbert Kennedy, Auchtyfardel’s eldest son, was provoked to strike his father’s assailant on the face. The people now began to flock about the party—Kennedy again moved on; but before he had got many paces away, he heard the sounds of a violent collision, and turned back with his cane uplifted to defend his son. It is alleged that Kennedy fell upon Houston with his cane—he had no weapon on his person—and while he did so, young Gilbert Kennedy drew his sword, and, rushing forward, wounded Houston mortally in the belly. The unfortunate man died a few days afterwards.[380] Auchtyfardel’s share in this transaction was held to infer his liability to an arbitrary punishment. Gilbert fled, and was outlawed, but afterwards was permitted to return home, and in time he succeeded to his father’s estate. We hear of him in [Sidenote: 1705.] 1730, as having been brought by that sad act of his youth into a very serious and religious frame of life. He was an elder of the church, and took great care of the morals of his servants. A maid, whom he on one occasion reproved severely, was led, by a diabolic spite, to mix some arsenic with the bread and milk which she prepared for the family breakfast, and the death of Houston had very nearly been avenged at the distance of twenty-four years from its occurrence. Happily, through the aid of a physician, the laird and his family escaped destruction.[381] A case more characteristic of the age than that of young Auchtyfardel occurred in the ensuing year. David Ogilvie of Cluny, having first thrust himself upon a funeral-party at the village of Meigle, and there done his best to promote hard drinking, insisted on accompanying two or three of the gentlemen on their way home, though his own lay another way. While proceeding along, he gave extreme annoyance to Andrew Cowpar, younger of Lochblair, by practical jokes of a gross kind, founded on the variance of sex in their respective horses. At length, Cowpar giving the other’s horse a switch across the face, to make it keep off, Ogilvie took violent offence at the act, demanded Cowpar’s whip under a threat of being otherwise pistolled, and, on a refusal, actually took out a pistol and shot his companion dead. The wretched murderer escaped abroad.