ll one monarch have,"

is affirmed to have been literally fulfilled on the coronation day of
James VI. and I. Passing on, we reach the resplendent Dawyck Woods. Here
are some of the finest larches in the kingdom, the first to be planted
in Britain, having that honour done them by the great Linnaeus himself,
it is said. Stobo--semi-Norman and Saxon--was the _plebania_ or
mother-kirk of half the county. Here lies all that is mortal of Robert
Hogg, a talented nephew of James Hogg. He was the friend and amanuensis
of both Scott and Lockhart, whom he assisted in the _Quarterly_.
Possessed of a keen literary sense, he would almost certainly have taken
a high place in literature but for the consumption which cut short his
promising career. (See "Life of Scott," vol. ix). At Happrew, in Stobo
parish, Wallace is said to have suffered defeat from the English in
1304. One of the most perfect specimens (recently explored) of a
Roman Camp is in the Lyne Valley, to the left, a little above the
Kirk of Lyne. On a height overlooking the Tarth and Lyne frowns the
massive pile of Drochil, planned by the Red Earl of Morton, who never
lived to occupy it, or to finish it, indeed, the "Maiden," in 1581,
cutting short his pleasures, his treacheries and hypocrisies. Now we
touch the Black Dwarf's Country--in the Manor Valley, to the right.
Barns Tower, a very complete peel specimen, stands sentinel at the
entrance to this "sweetest glen of all the South." It is around Barns
that John Buchan's "John Burnet of Barns" centres. The Black Dwarf's
grave is at Manor Kirk, and the cottage associated with his misanthropic
career is also pointed out. Scott, in 1797, visited Manor (Hallyards) at
his friend Ferguson's, and foregathered with David Ritchie, the
prototype of one of the least successful and most tedious of his
characters. (See William Chambers's account of the visit). St. Gordian's
Cross, mentioned in a previous chapter, is further up the valley, where
also are the ruins of Posso, a place-name in the "Bride of Lammermoor."
Presently we come to Neidpath Castle, dominating Peebles, the key to the
Upper Tweed fastnesses. When or by whom it was built is unknown. In
1795, it was held by "Old Q," fourth Duke of Queensberry. Wordsworth's
sonnet on the spoliation of its magnificent woods (an act done to spite
the heir of entail) stigmatises for all time the memory of one of the
worst reprobates in history.

PLATE 16

MELROSE AND THE
EILDONS