Tkan'sac'I'ions. 53 



legs) have arms and legs rather better developed than the 

 Littles, Shorts, and Ileavysides ? It occuri-ed to me that those 

 well-meaning- but clamiish individuals who found schools, hospitals, 

 and institutions mainly for the benefit of persons of their own and 

 their wives' surnames might help us here ; but on further inquiry 

 I was given to understand that the trustees of such institutions 

 did not adhere literally to the express wishes of the founders. 

 With well-defined names like Jardine, Carruthers, Carlyle, 

 Graham, &c., one would expect a purer lineage ; but what are we 

 to say of the Richardsons ? How separate them from the Richards, 

 Dicks, Dickies, Dicksons that we meet with mingled among- them ? 

 Then there is the question, why do they swarm tog-ether ? Thomas 

 Carlyle went in for permanence rather than change, and has given 

 us the terse saying, " Here or nowhere is America." But his 

 favourite Goethe says, " That 'twas to give room for wandering in 

 it that the world was made so wide." One thing the study of 

 Dumfriesshire surnames points to is that there is no well-defined 

 Scottish nation. The same sort of blood flows in our Lowland 

 veins as does in that of our Southern neighbours. " The Scots 

 wham Bruce has often led " were led by an Englishman of Norman 

 lineage. The very word Wallace means the " foreigner," the 

 " stranger." Under Malcolm Canmore and David L, who was Earl 

 of Cumberland, the Saxons came from the south by thousands and 

 the Normans by hundreds. King- Robert Bruce owned estates in 

 England. The boyhood of David L was spent at the English 

 court, and there accompanied him to Scotland the Riddel, whose 

 sons acquired lands in Glencairn. The Mandevilles or Mundells 

 crossed from Normandy. The Hunters trace their origin to 

 Normandy. Baliol and Comyn are of Norman lineage. Richard- 

 son is a Saxon word. In the xx. chap, of M'Dowall's 

 History of Dumfries a short allusion is made to other 

 surnames and families beside those I have discussed that have 

 played a part in the affairs of the burgh for at least the last three 

 hundred years. Some historical notices and guesses as to their 

 origin are given. These names are of mixed race, but the Saxon 

 element preponderates. The great natural features that separated 

 dale from dale and strath from strath, the g-reat rivers formidable 

 to river clans, the weary mosses that kept families apart, have now 

 lost their importance. Roads, rails, bridges, telephones, postal 

 systems, newspapers, and electricity have made lig-ht of nature's 



