"The inhabitants of the village," writes Charles Sharpe, "still relate some circumstances of the murder, not recorded by Fountainhall. Mrs. Nimmo, attended by her maid, had gone from Edinburgh to the castle of Corstorphine." After the murder, "she took refuge in a garret of the castle, but was discovered by one of her slippers, which dropped through a crevice in the floor. It need hardly be added that, till lately, the inhabitants of the village were greatly annoyed, of a moonlight night, by the appearance of a woman clothed in white, with a bloody sword in her hand, wandering and waiting near the pigeon-house." She was seized and brought before the sheriff in Edinburgh. She confessed her crime, but pleaded that Lord Forester, being ferocious and intoxicated with drink, had drawn his sword; that, to save herself, she had snatched it from him, and that in the struggle he had fallen upon it, and so killed himself. In spite of this defence, sentence of death was passed upon her, which she contrived to have postponed for two months, under a false pretext of her condition. During this interval she escaped one evening from the Tolbooth, disguised as a man, but she was recaptured next day at Fala Mill, and beheaded at the Market Cross on the 12th November 1679. At her execution she appeared dressed in deep mourning, with a long veil, which, before laying her head on the block, she took off, and replaced with a white taffeta hood. She met her fate with great courage.[56] It was said at the time that, in spite of his professed Presbyterianism, a dispensation from the Pope to marry Mrs. Nimmo was found among Lord Forester's papers, and that his delay in using it had caused her fury. [56] Fountainhall's _Historical Notices_, vol. i. p. 231-233. By the terms of the patent, the barony and lands of Corstorphine passed to Lord Forester's nephew, William Baillie, his mother having been Lilias, youngest daughter of the first baron. He became third Lord Forester, and in his line the title has since remained. The fertile pastures that surround Corstorphine provided our forefathers with that favourite delicacy, known as Corstorphine cream. It was a variety of the old Scottish dish called "Hattit Kit," and much resembled it.[57] [57] This preparation of milk is very ancient, and probably originated among the Tartars, by whom it was made of mares' milk, and called _Koumiss_. It is believed to have been introduced into this country by the wandering Eastern tribes, who, leaving their native Phœnicia, gradually spread themselves along the north of Africa, and, leaving traces of their passage in the Basque Provinces and Brittany, colonised first Cornwall, and then the western coast of this island; and a few of whose customs still linger among us. There is a very interesting dissertation on this subject in _The Pillars of Hercules_, by the late David Urquhart, M. P.