before the saids Commissioners hereby commissionat, ... With power to the saids Commissioners or their said quorums, To decern and Adjudge them to be burned, or otherwise to be execute to death within such space and after such a manner as they shall think fit, and appoints the saids commissioners, there said quorum or Clerk, to transmit the haill process which shall be ledd before them against the said Elspeth M'Cowen and Mary Millar, and severall steps thereof and verdict of the inquest to be given thereupon to the saids Lords of his Majesties privie Councill, betwixt and the ffyfteenth day of June nixt to come."(27) On the 26th of July the committee of Privy Council reported that they had examined the proceedings of the commissioners in the case of Elspeth M'Ewen (the report signed by the Lord Advocate), who had been pronounced guilty upon her own confession and the evidence of witnesses "of a compact and correspondence with the devil, and of charms and of accession to malefices." It was ordered that the sentence of death against Elspeth should be executed under care of the Steward of Kirkcudbright and his deputies. Found guilty by her own confession, a certain means to end a miserable life, Elspeth M'Ewen suffered the extreme penalty of being burned at the stake, the execution taking place in what is now known as Silver Craigs Park, on the 24th day of August, 1698. The following extracts connected with the trial and execution are taken from some old Kirkcudbright records, which were brought to light by the late Mr James Nicholson:-- "Ane accompt of my (George Welsh) depursements as Thessr.[14] from Michaelmas, 1697, to Michaelmas, 1698, as follows-- Item for Item to Barbara Roddin for ane pound and ane half of candle yt night the Assyse sat on Elspet M'Keown 000 09 00 22 July, 1698. Item to the men that took William Kirk, by Ba. Campble's order 000 04 00 Item given to him yt day 000 03 00 Item for Satterday, Sunday and Monday yrafter 000 09 00 Item given to William Kirk of earnest by Ba. Campble's orders in money and in aill with him 00j 0j 00 Item to William Kirk for six days at three shills per day 000 18 00 4 Aut., 1698. Item to William Kirk for twenty days tyme yt he was in prison at ffour shills per day, is 004 00 00 20 Aut., 1698. Item given to the Proveist to give William Kirk to buy drink, and by his orders to buy ane leg mutton 000 ij 00 Item. Sspent by the Proveist wt Howell and Ba. Dunbar, the day of Elspet M'Keown's execution, ane gill brandie 000 04 06 Item be the Proveist's order, to William Kirk to buy meal wt. 000 10 00