almost any major skin disease might be called leprosy. The earliest mention of this illness is to be found in an original letter written by an eye-witness in Ulster at the time the king made a truce with Sir Henry Mandeville on 12 July 1327. The writer of this letter reported that Robert was so feeble and struck down by illness that he would not live, 'for he can scarcely move anything but his tongue'. However, none of the several accounts of his last years by people who were with him refer to any sign of a skin ailment. Barbour writes of the king's illness that 'it began through a benumbing brought on by his cold lying', during the months of wandering from 1306 to 1309. It has been proposed alternatively that he suffered from eczema, tuberculosis, syphilis, motor neuron disease, cancer or a series of strokes. There does not seem to be any evidence as to what the king himself or his physicians believed his illness to be. Nor is there any evidence of an attempt in his last years to segregate the king in any way from the company of friends, family, courtiers, or foreign diplomats. In October 1328 the Pope finally lifted the interdict from Scotland and the excommunication of Robert. The king's last journey appears to have been a pilgrimage to the shrine of Saint Ninian at Whithorn; this was possibly in search of a miraculous cure, or to make his peace with God. With Moray by his side, Robert set off from his manor at Cardross for Tarbert on his 'great ship', thence to the Isle of Arran, where he celebrated Christmas of 1328 at the hall of Glenkill near Lamlash. Thence he sailed to the mainland to visit his son and his bride, both mere children, now installed at Turnberry Castle, the head of the earldom of Carrick and once his own main residence. He journeyed overland, being carried on a litter, to Inch in Wigtownshire: houses were built there and supplies brought to that place, as though the king's condition had deteriorated. At the end of March 1329 he was staying at Glenluce Abbey and at Monreith, from where St Ninian's Cave was visited. Early in April he arrived at the shrine of St Ninian at Whithorn. He fasted four or five days and prayed to the saint, before returning by sea to