 At this time there were about 100 people employed on the estate . Fourteen under @-@ gardeners , who were paid extra to wear kilts , worked on the extensive grounds that included a nine @-@ hole golf course , tennis and squash courts , heated turtle and alligator ponds and an aviary including birds of paradise and humming birds . Soil for the grounds was imported from Ayrshire and figs , peaches , grapes and nectarines were grown in greenhouses . The interior boasted an orchestrion that could simulate the sounds of brass , drum and woodwind , an air @-@ conditioned billiards room , and a jacuzzi . This opulence could not be sustained indefinitely . The Bullough finances gradually declined in the 1920s , and their interest in , and visits to Rùm decreased . Sir George died in France in July 1939 — he was interred in the family mausoleum on Rùm . His widow continued to visit Rùm as late as 1954 . She died in London in 1967 , aged 98 , and was buried next to her husband in the Rùm mausoleum . In 1957 Lady Bullough had sold the whole island , save for the mausoleum , but including the castle and its contents , to the Nature Conservancy Council ( now Scottish Natural Heritage ) for the " knock @-@ down price of £ 23 @,@ 000 " on the understanding that it would be used as a national nature reserve . 
