of the easiest. Ruined churches had to be
restored; ministers had to be found, and "honest stipends" provided; and
the community from an ecclesiastical point of view reorganized. And, as
might be expected, the changes contemplated were not easily or quickly
effected. Old habits are not readily abandoned, and consequently it took
many years to raise the general religious life of the Borders to the level
of that of other districts of the country where the conditions, to begin
with, were more favourable. Even in the beginning of the eighteenth
century, when that renowned minister, the Rev. Thomas Boston, began his
pastorate in Ettrick, the state of matters from a religious point of view
was such as might well have appalled the stoutest heart. His parishioners
were rude and lawless to a degree. We are told that on Sundays some of
them went, not to church, but to the churchyard, and tried to drown the
voice of the preacher by producing all sorts of discordant sounds; and
even those who ventured within the walls ostensibly to worship, would rise
up during the service with "rude noise and seeming impatience," and leave
the building. The condition of this parish--and others in the district
were probably not much better--has been not inaptly described as "an
unploughed field covered with tangled weeds and thorns, and sheltering
many foul creatures." But the morals of the people, under the influence of
the faithful ministrations of Boston, were gradually reformed, and the
desert was made to bud and blossom like the rose. And what was effected
in this particular district may be taken as a fair sample of the good work
accomplished by the Church throughout the whole length of the Borders. Its
influence was potent and far-reaching, and mighty to the pulling down of
the strongholds of evil. "How did it happen," says a modern writer, "that
the raiding and reiving race which inhabited the Borders became so
peaceful and law-abiding? That were a long tale to tell, but the credit of
it belongs to those preachers Sir Walter was too superfine and cavalier to
understand. In this work his own great-grandfather, for nineteen years the
faithful and diligent minister of Yarrow, bore his own part, and, though
the great-grandson owed his genius to his mother, the minister's
grand-daughter, he failed to appreciate the most characteristic treasure
of his inheritance. He remembered that Richard Cameron--founder of the
Cameronians, sternest of Presbyteria