72 THE BORDER ANGLER. 



may be traced upwards into a more open country, 

 where the banks retreat farther from each other, and 

 the vale exhibits a good deal of dry ground, which has 

 not been neglected by the active cultivators of the dis- 

 trict." Near the mouth of this little stream was the 

 singular old bridge across the Tweed which figures in 

 the same book. It consisted of three stone pillars, or 

 towers, connected by wooden planks ; on the middle 

 one the toll-keeper lived, and levied his duties upon 

 those who passed. The trout-fishing in the Tweed 

 here is hardly equal to the average, the weavers of 

 Galashiels being, like all borderers, addicted to " cast- 

 ing angles in the brook," and many of them are no 

 contemptible adepts. A very unwise attempt was a 

 couple of years ago made in the name of Lord So- 

 merville, but really, we believe, by Mr. Broadwood, to 

 stop the public right of angling here ; but the Sheriff 

 of Roxburghshire, after two or three contradictory de- 

 cisions, finally gave it as his opinion that the right of 

 salmon-fishing does not carry with it any exclusive 

 right of trout-fishing. 



We are now at Melrose, whose ancient ecclesiasti- 

 cal splendour has been rubbed up of late years by Sir 

 Walter and local antiquaries, after its former inhabit- 

 ants had been consigned to posterity as luxurious hypo- 

 crites in a brave (but coarse) old Reformation song — 



" Of Scotland wele the Freiris of Faill, 

 Their lymmerie lang has lestit ; 

 The monkis of Meh'oss maid gude kale. 

 On Frydays quhen they fastit ;" 



with certain other particulars of monkish habits which 

 we decline here to recapitulate. Overshadowed by the 



