Here, then, is an end to all our previous dreams of royal splendour, for there stands the pious monarch, David, King of Scotland, "His staff his sceptre, his grey hairs his crown," trembling in presence of his God, breathing the general confession of his sins with the beings of the same kindred and frail nature as himself that stood around him. THE LEGEND OF THE CHURCH OF ABERCROMBIE. From authentic documents referred to by Sir John Connel in his "History of Tithes," Abercrombie, or Abercromlin, appears to have been a parish as far back as 1174. How long that character pertained to this portion of Fife we cannot say, but the church is obviously of very great antiquity. Having become so ruinous as to be unfit for a place of worship, it was abandoned in 1646, and since that time the parishes of Abercrombie and St Monans have been united, and the old church of St Monans, situated on the sea-shore, has served for the use of both. In a romantic and beautiful situation within the grounds now forming part of the domain of Sir Ralph Abercrombie Anstruther of Balcaskie, Baronet, and in the old burying-place, still used as a cemetery by the Balcaskie family, stands the remains of the old grey parish church of Abercrombie, with its encircling lime-trees and its green ivy garment duskily investing its aged walls. Dedicated to St Mary and St Margaret, tradition has deduced the origin of Abercrombie Church from the piety and wealth of two sisters similarly named. About the middle of the twelfth century, the broad lands and swelling coffers of Sir Humphrey Abercrombie (failing male issue) devolved upon two maiden sisters, Mary and Margaret, only children of the baronet; and as both were young, and of unimpeachable descent--the true Norman blood mantling in every vein--the heiresses early became objects of absorbing interest in the eyes of such of the surrounding knights and thanes as could advance pretensions to as clear a shield and pure a lineage as their own. Educated within the walls of the convent at Haddington, the sisters' limited experience and unripe notions of the world would have inadequately fitted them for the duties entailed upon them by their new position, were it not that nature had beneficently gifted the elder with a certain strength and self-reliance of character, imperfectly developed in the cloister, but daily expanding and maturing in a broader sphere, in proportion as circumstances seemed to call it into action, and demand its vigorous exercise. The younger was a graceful, gentle girl, gifted with rare beauty, and with a disposition as femininely soft and placid as the mild and dove-like eyes through which her soul looked out upon a world but newly revealed to her enfranchised gaze.