er, remains here of the buildings
which once sheltered the royal Saxons and their court. In later days,
Milfield has a melancholy interest attaching to it from its connection
with the battle of Flodden; for, on the heights above, King James fixed
his camp, in the hope that Surrey would lead his troops across the plain
below. Of the other considerable heights of the Cheviot range, Carter
Fell and Peel Fell are the best known; they both lie right on the border
line of England and Scotland, between the North Tyne and the Rede Water.
As we have already seen, the men of Tynedale and Redesdale bore a
reputation for lawlessness in the time of the Border "Moss-trooping"
days, and until nearly the end of the eighteenth century the tradesmen
and guilds of Newcastle would take no apprentice who hailed from either
of these dales. The tracks and passes between the hills, once alive with
frequent foray and wild pursuit, are now silent and solitary but for the
occasional passing of a shepherd or farmer, and the flocks of sheep
grazing as they move slowly up the hillsides. A quaint survival of the
remembrances of those days was unexpectedly brought before me one day. A
child presented me with a bunch of cotton-grass, gathered on the moors
not far from the Roman-Wall. I asked if she knew what they were that she
had brought. "Moss-troopers," she replied.

Many of the Cheviot heights bear most suggestive and interesting names,
such as Cushat [7] Law, Kelpie [8] Strand, Earl's Seat, Stot [9] Crags,
Deer Play, Wether Lair, Bloodybushedge, Monkside, etc., etc.

[Footnote 7: Cushat = a wood-pigeon.]
[Footnote 8: Kelpie = a water-witch.]
[Footnote 9: Stot = a bullock.]

In these lonely wilds, which occupy all the northwest of the county, one
may travel all day and meet with no living thing save the birds of the
air, and a few shy, wild creatures of the moorlands; curve after curve,
the rounded hills stretch away into the distance, grass-grown or
heatherclad, with occasional peat-mosses; above is the "grey gleaming
sky," and, all around, a stillness as of vast untrodden wastes, and a
sense of solitude out of all proportion to the actual extent of this
lonely region. The fascination of it, however, admits of no denial, even
on the part of those newly making its acquaintance; while those who in
childhood or youth roam over its wild fells, and feel the spell of its
brooding mystery, retain in their hearts for all time an unfading
remembrance of