The side windows have also arch mouldings, which die against the splays
of the jambs (see Fig. 886), and the hoods are terminated with roses, or
animals like lizards, much decayed. The tracery is simple, and the large
circle over the central light is peculiar. The sconsions are plain, but
the sconsion arches are segmental and moulded (see Figs. 885 and 888).
The two lancet windows to the west have hoods terminated with roses, and
the sconsion arches are segmental and moulded. Beneath the windows a
filleted roll runs round the building as a string course, and one course
below it is a broadly splayed base course, with a lower base under it
(see Fig. 883). These mouldings only extend round the older part of the
structure, the newer portion at the west end having a separate base of a
different character.
The east gable still retains its sloping cope, which has at the base a
small gablet erected upon the skew putt, finished with a fleur-de-lys
ridge. In the gable (see Fig. 883) over the east window there is a
circular aperture, now blocked up; and on the apex there has been
erected, in comparatively recent times, a plain bellcot, with pyramidal
roof.
On a stone at the base of the bellcot the following Roman letters have
been run in with lead--viz., V Æ S A C, and below these, M I H M. Round
the corner of the same stone, on the north side, are the similar letters
R I. The meaning of these letters has not been explained. Possibly the
stone has been brought from somewhere else, where the context might have
rendered the letters intelligible.
From the general style of the details of the building there can be no
difficulty in fixing its date during the middle pointed period. Most of
the mouldings are of an early character, but some of the features (such
as the arch mouldings dying on the jambs) are later. Besides, in
Scotland allowance must be made for backwardness, and we should be
inclined to regard this structure as being of about the end of the
fourteenth century. It is valuable as an example of the decorated period
in Scotland, of which period few, if any, parish churches are now to be
found.