Obtained in 1938 by the National Trust for Scotland, this is the infamous cottage with thatched roofing where Burns and a group of unmarried friends established a society - the Tarbolton Bachelors - to discuss issues of the day. The membership rules were clear: "No haughty, self-conceited person, who looks upon himself as superior to the rest of the club, and especially no mean-spirited, worldly mortal, whose only will is to heap up money, shall upon any pretence be admitted." On Castle Street, in the nearby village of Mauchline, is the Burns House Museum (tel. 01290/550-045; Tues-Sat 10am-5pm). Burns married his wife Jean Armour here in 1788, and this cottage was their home for a spell. Nearby, two locations, Mossgiel and Lochlea, are where Burns's family farms were run with little success earlier in the poet's life.