Beanscroft Farm lies on Grassyards Road in the parish of Fenwick in East Ayrshire a few miles to the west of Kilmarnock and the farmer there was known as a good, honest, hard work and God fearing member of the community, however strange happenings at the farmhouse and in the byres slowly convinced him and his family that he was being regularly tormented by none other a personage than the Devil himself.

could not be so easily dismissed and the strange appearance of moving lights of different colours and the breaking of the ropes that tethered the cattle without signs of cutting were beyond any straight forward explanation.

[7] John Goldie the 'Philosopher' was God fearing, but had no truck with the presence on Earth of the Devil and made it known that he could solve this riddle in a Sherlock Holmes style of logical investigation.

Despite his reservations the farmer invited him to the farm, accompanied by his friends, Mr Gillies of Kilmaurs the 'New Licht' minister and Robert Muir a Kilmarnock merchant and Kirk elder.

Once darkness had fallen the farmer, hiding in the byre as instructed, became aware of the usual disturbances and suddenly saw a shadowy figure of a man holding a trumpet-like instrument with which he was making the unnatural sounds that had scared him so, rushing forward he seized the culprit only to find that it was his own son.

[8] It transpired that the son had some knowledge of chemistry and had made what we would call coloured fireworks and that the ropes had been severed with Nitric Acid, then known as Aqua Fortis (strong water).

Writing from Mossgiel Farm on the following morning of Friday 8 September 1786, Burns said: "My Friend My Brother, You will have heard that poor Armour has repaid my amorous mortgages double.

[33] "If we lie down in the grave, the whole nun a piece of broke machinery, to moulder with the clods of the valley — be it so; at least there is an end of pain, care, woes and wants: if that part of us called Mind, does survive the apparent destruction of the man - away with old-wife prejudices and tales!