on the left bank of the stream, we have "one of the most classical and far-famed spots in Scotland-the hill of Cowdenknowes. Of itself it is a very pretty striking hill, starting forward from the adjacent eminences, so as to be prominent in the scene, and rising in a picturesque conical shape. No traveller, however incurious, could possibly pass up or down the valley without putting questions about it." The next tributary to the Tweed in our district is the Eden, which Sir Thomas Dick Lauder calls a "classic stream." Its source lies in some boggy ground in the parish of Gordon, and its upper portion has a very ditch-like character. The channel, however, has received a sufficiency of water when it enters upon the policy of Newton-Don to make it ornamental there; and in these grounds "it produces a pretty little romantic scene, by throwing itself over a precipitous rock of considerable height. The spot is called Stitchell Linn." This is a good locality for the naturalist, and we shall have future occasion to mention it in connection with one of the most melancholy incidents in Border story. From the Linn the Eden runs a gentle race through a vale beautifully wooded and cultivated, "and resembling some of our happiest English scenes." In about the middle of it is situated the peaceful village of Ednam*, the birth-place of the author of the "Seasons," and whence the father of Cook, the voyager, migrated southwards to give England the honour of his name. The Leet belongs entirely to the Merse, and its sluggish pace and muddy channel prove at once the levelness of the country it drains and the depth of the alluvial soil. Originating in some boggy ground near Hilton, it pursues its way westward, skirting the demesnes of the ancient family of Swinton; and then, bending southward, it gives a name to Leitholm, when it seeks to hide its stream, choked with sedges, in the plantations of Belchester and of the Hirsell. Mr. Stoddart has given an excellent description of the Leet. "During the summer season," he says, "it is a mere ditch; in many places not above four or five span in width, and, where broadest, still capable of being leapt across. The run of water is, comparatively speaking, insignificant, not equaling.in the average a cubic foot. This, however, as it proceeds, is every now and then expanded over a considerable surface, and forms a pool of some depth; in fact, the whole stream from head to foot, pursuing as it does a winding course for upwards of twelve miles, is a continued chain of pools, fringed during the summer on both sides with rushes and * The "Aednaham" of the olden time, and "a waste" in the 12th century. There is now no remnant of the church built there and then in honour of St. Cuthbert. See Quart. Rev, lxxxv. p. 118. VOL. I. C water-flags, and choked up in many parts with pickerel weed and other aquatic plants. The channel of Leet contains shellmarl, and its banks being hollowed out beneath, afford, independent of occasional stones and tree-roots, excellent shelter for trout. Not many years ago, the whole course of it was infested with pike, but the visit of some otters, irrespective of the angler's art, has completely cleared them out, and thus allowed the trout, which were formerly scarce, to become more numerous*." But the Tweed's most considerable tributary from the north is the Whiteadder, a river to my liking superior to her more celebrated sister in all but magnitude and force. I love better its haughs, its sunny upland valleys, its steep banks, its many cheerful picturesque mills, its trouting streams, its sinuous reaches near home, and its far-away meanders amidst the green hills. In the very heart of the Lammermuirs, about three miles beyond our extreme limit, and on the sunny side of a green brae, there is a "White-well," supposed to be 1150 feet above the medium sea-levelt, whence bubbles to light a perennial spring whose copious waters fall into an extensive bog below. Drained by numerous fissures this water oozes from the bog into a stony channel which leads it southwards down the narrow vale, in which it receives many little livelier runlets that brattle down the green hills on each side. Thus before the Whiteadder has flown three miles to Millknowe, a man would strain to leap its current. There it meets the Fasney burn, and doubled by the union, it hies its way down the valley for nearly two miles before it enters Berwickshire. It has now become a fine water flowing, always in an east and southerly direction, and in a most sinuous tract, over a rough stony bottom, mostly in streams, but with frequent still reaches and occasional deep dark pools. This is the character of the water everywhere; and the valley which it enlivens is open and sunny, widening and contracting at unequal intervals, for now the base of the pastoral hills will almost touch the stream, and then a level haugh will intervene to separate them alternately on the right side and the left. In the upper parts of the water there is little wood, none indeed but a hanging birch cover which overlooks the entrance into Berwickshire; for the hills have been deprived of their forest by the flocks which now graze them in the security of peace. Having received into its channel the lively Bothell, which drains a parallel ridge of the Lammermuirs to the east of that drained by the Whiteadder, the latter turns abruptly southwards, passes the Craneshaws, and ripples down a vale cultivated for the growth of oats and barley and bordered with green sloping hills. Then the Dye, coming from the west, gives the main * Angler's Companion, p. 22. † Stat. Acc. Berwicks. p. 267. river additional strength; and thus it leaves Ellem-ford with a broader and heavier stream guided eastwards for a space by very steep heath-clad banks. It glides on and soon overtakes the pretty vale of Abbey St. Bathans. Monnienut burn joins here, racing down a narrow glen in which Godscroft stands; and a little lower down, the Whiteadder receives another burn which rushes from the ravine in whose shelter Mattie Pringle was wont to hang out her hospitable sign*. There is here some aboriginal wood and a good deal of recent plantation, which the river leaves on passing the Retreat, when it winds around the base of Cockburnlaw almost in a circle. It has now attained the culminating point of attraction to the angler, and there is no finer water anywhere. The river flows on, washing the base of the sandstone fossiliferous bank at Preston-bridge,-lightening up the rich valley of Preston-haugh,-lending beauty to the open demesnes of Broomhouse, and to the sylvan and cereal grounds of Blanerne; and thence onwards, with its customary curves and beauty, to the romantic scenery at and about Chirnside-bridge. Another wide sweep, directed by the steep banks on the north, brings the river to Allanton, where it receives the tribute of the Blackadder. Now a noble stream, the Whiteadder meanders, at a moderated pace, through the sunny haughs of Whitehall; and thence, for several miles, it winds with wide sweeps, alternately from right to left, until it has passed the overhanging cliffs on which the ancient castle of Edrington did stand. This portion of the river is excellent in beauty, and is a series of lovely pictures, each well-defined by the peculiar sinuous character of the channel. From Edrington the Whiteadder proceeds slowly to Newmills, where, turning to the south, it waters a vale without much interest, and soon afterwards mingles with the Tweed. The tide influences the flow of the stream for upwards of a mile. The Blackadder takes its rise at Wedderlie in the parish of Westruther, at an elevation of about 1130 feet. The dark tincture of its water is derived from the peat-mosses in which its sources are placed. It flows in a south-easterly direction, and as it descends along the skirt of Harelaw moor, meanders through a rich meadow which promises well to the naturalist. In its future course the Blackadder skirts the plantations that shroud Marchmont-house,-traverses the policies of Kimmerghame and of Kelloe, and winds in the midst of the grounds of Blackadder and Allanton as if loath to leave them. The fall of the river is inconsiderable, and its bed is one of coarse gravel and large * There is a tolerably accurate description of this secluded inn in Mr. Maxwell's Border Tales, p. 28. Lond. 1852. stones, confined by banks which rarely rise above a few feet, and are ploughed or grazed to the very brink*. These waters drain the west :—the Eye and Ale are the principal leaders to the drainage of the eastern parts of Berwickshiret. The latter is an inconsiderable stream running southeasterly from the Press in the parish of Coldingham, to Millbank near Eyemouth, where it falls into the Eye at a romantic spot distinguished by a remarkable elevation called the Kip-rock‡. The Eye hides its source in the Lammermuirs, and it flows on, in a south-easterly direction, for ten or twelve miles, when it turns nearly at right angles on its entrance into the vale of Ayton, which leads its waters to the sea. The early course of this water is bare and uninteresting, but from Grant's-house downwards there is considerable beauty, and so much natural wood of varied character as to render the banks fruitful of those herbs which the botanist loves to cull§. The valley of Ayton is more beautiful-indeed it may vie with any we have in the district for richness and variety of scenery, nor could we affirm the judge was partial that awarded it the superiority. It is worthy of the fine castle that now overlooks it from very near the site whereupon stood the Bastle of rude and dangerous days. This hurried sketch of the Eastern Borders will have failed in its object, if it has not satisfied the naturalist that the district is peculiarly favourable to his researches,-well-adapted to furnish him with subjects for a practical study of the different classes of organized beings, and wherein he may fit himself to judge and determine upon the various theories which have been propounded relative to their classification, their relations, their linear or dichotomous development, or their reticular or quincuncial reunions; and how far there is that strict connection which is asserted to exist between complexity of structure and the number and perfection of their faculties and instincts. It was in part to test these theories, which have been supposed to be of considerable importance in physiology, that the materials of this volume were collected; but certainly I was more bound to the task by natural predilection, and by an inborn love which urged * Stat. Acc. Berwicks. pp. 66, 224. Kerr's View, p. 44. Stat. Acc. Berwicks. p. 131. The post-road runs parallel to the water from Ayton to Grant's-house. Starting from Ayton, Cobbett says, "When we get farther on the land gets poor and hilly; the road twists about among the hills and follows (towards its source) a little run of water, on the sides of which are some narrow meadows. The hills are here covered with scrubby woods, very much like those in the poorest parts of Hampshire and Dorsetshire."-Tour in Scotland, p. 87. THEIR FITNESS TO THE NATURALIST. 21 me on to illustrate and declare the riches of my native county*. "Trahit sua quemque voluptas." I felt that in following out my plan to register every tree and grass and weed therein,-to know every insect, worm, fish, reptile, bird and beast that were its denizens, I could not fail, at the same time, to discover its many pastoral, its many sylvan,-its many landscape beauties which lie hid amidst its hills and denes, and hard by its waters. And there was the additional attraction of visiting spots which have been made for ever eloquent by the events of which they are the monuments, for the district is indeed rife with places that derive interest from historical recollections,-with everlasting hills whence arose the smoke of druidical sacrifices,—with rills whence was lifted the water of the baptism of the first converts to our Christianity,-with cairns, camps, and seats of regal and lordly power, with ancient priories and cells and abbeys that are still our admiration,-with battle-fields of note,-with strong castles and towers and bastles,—with fairy traditions and love passages, with much poetry and romance,—and with the birthplaces of men who have risen above common humanity. I have indicated by short notices many of these memorabilia as I have gone on in my register, for specimens collected from them are to be treasured not more for their own peculiar value than for the reminiscences and thoughts which the spot gives life to. "A plant," to use the words of Sir James Edward Smith, "gathered in a celebrated or delightful spot, is, like the hair of a friend, more dear to memory than even a portrait, because it excites the imagination, without presuming to fill it.” "Thanks be to Nature, some green spots remain There still are flowery meadows, pathless woods, Groves, hills and vales, forests and solitudes!"-C. WEBBE. * "We are the better as well as the happier for local attachment.' Southey. Life, ii. p. 182. |