4/2 



The Country Gentleman" s Magarjinc 



over-ripened, and others not sufficiently ad- 

 vanced to allow of ascertaining their names. 

 There were also sevei'ai kinds of Chenopodea:, the 

 spiny bur-dock — Xanthium spinosum, and a 

 number of others. The study of these " wool- 

 weeds " is well deserving of attention from 

 botanists, who may have opportunities of in- 

 specting them from time to time ; and the 

 local horticultural society might impart a good 

 deal of interesting emulation among the mill- 

 workers by offering them premiums for plants 

 grown from the wool-imported seeds. 



Abbotsford, of all places in Britain, is perhaps 

 that which is most resorted to by tourists. In 

 this district, says an eminent border author, 

 " grandeur is combined with beauty and fertility,'' 

 which well deserved panegyric has its counter- 

 part on the Melrose road, ^^'ithin a few hundred 

 yards of the seat of the mighty minstrel, where 

 strangers cannot help forming a poor idea of 

 Scottish agriculture, on passing between two pas- 

 ture fields, which, for poverty and mismanage- 

 ment, have, we should hope, no parallel in the coun- 

 try — many strong "green-growing rushes" testi- 

 fying in some parts to the total neglect of drain- 

 age, while throughout the rest a thick inter- 

 spersion of uncutbarren-headed thistles, shewsthe 

 unpardonable neglect of scythe work, as well as 

 the sterility of the land, in not being able to 

 produce even thistle seed. What a relief to look 

 up from such a surface of waste and want to the 

 green slopes of the magnificent Eildon Hills on 

 the one side, and be)-ond the Tweed on the 

 other, to the evidences of honourable prosperity, 

 presented by the rising mansions and demesnes 

 of Galamanufacturers,on the commandingslopes 

 of Glenmayne, Netherby, and King's Knowes. 

 The splendid silver firs and other trees which, 

 further onward, form the judiciously-thinned and 

 Avell-underwooded plantations on both sides of 

 the highway, as well as the upstretchingand hill- 

 crowning belts, were all planted by Sir Walter 

 Scott, and testify to his great taste in landscape 

 gardening, as well as to the skilful care bestowed 

 upon them by his successors. Perhaps, had he 

 lived till the trees attained to effective sizes, he 

 v/ould have grouped some of the upper portions, 

 and broken up the formal belt outlines in 

 others ; but, seeing that this was not pennitted 

 in his days, few will be inclined to dispute the 

 propriety of retaining the whole as formed and 

 left by their gifted designer. 



In the hedgerow at Faldonside, the pleasing 

 eftcct of purple beech, when occasionally inter^ 

 spersed, among other road-side trees, is well 

 exemplified. And here also is exhibited the 



superiority of dwarf ornamental trees, such as 

 laburnum, hawthorn, mountain ash, &c., over 

 the taller forest trees, in road and field hedge- 

 rows, combining, as they do, ornament with suf- 

 ficient shelter, while, unlike the latter, they 

 neither harm the roads, hedges, nor field crops 

 by either drip or shade. Here the breaking 

 and storing of road metal is still done in heaps 

 upon the roadside, instead of in recessed depots — 

 a highly reprehensible practice, especially when 

 it is adopted on such a narrow road, darkened 

 in most places by high overhanging plantations. 

 Turning off to Lindean Station, Avhich is situated 

 at the lower end of one of the finest haughs on 

 Ettrick, an opportunity is afforded of obsen-ing 

 the mistaken economy of parsimonious railway 

 directors, who, instead of providing comfortable 

 accommodation for passengers, have furnished 

 them with only scanty deal defences against 

 wind and rain ; surrounded by the thick, ram- 

 pant, unrestricted growth of seeding thistles, 

 nettles, and other ^■ile weeds ; instead of 

 neatly-kept flower plots, and well-cultivated 

 garden ground. 



Among the rich pasture parks and well culti- 

 vated fields at Bridgelands, near Selkirk, two 

 divisions were cropped with early-sown rape, 

 some of which was coming into flower, and on 

 which flocks of well-bred sheep were enjoying 

 a plentiful and seemingly highly relished repast. 

 Another considerable field of later sown rape on 

 the south bank of the Ettrick, opposite the 

 Duke of Buccleuch's hunting residence of Bow- 

 hill, was being eaten down in like manner, and, 

 if not too barely bitten-in now, this last is 

 likely to afford excellent spring feed for breeding 

 ewes. Such examples of successful rape culture 

 are deserving of being widely followed by Scotch 

 farmers ; and if its value had been better under- 

 stood by them, there would now be many well- 

 clothed fields of it, in place of black and bare 

 land, throughout wide districts in which the 

 turnip crop has failed. And had many taken 

 advantage of the late almost unprecedentedly 

 early season, by sowing rape after the removal of 

 their earliest corn crops, there would now be pro- 

 spects of abundant autumn and spring feeding for 

 bestial, where much anxiety presently exists as 

 to how the interval between the present and the 

 next grass season is to be met. 



A drive through the grounds at Bowhill only 

 afforded an opportunity of admiring the general 

 management and keeping of the arable and pas- 

 ture lands, roads, fences, woodlands, orna- 

 mental waters, and what is technically known as 

 the kept ground. In the latter, the abundance 



