1886-87.] ci^id Otiicr Antiquities. 39 



friend ; and in one case — tliat of the parish of Prestonpans — 

 the writer bewails the difficulties in the way of his study of 

 Natural History, especially the domain of ocean-life. The Eev, 

 W. B. Cunningham thus writes, half in auger, half in sorrow : 

 " It is to be regretted that, in some of those districts in which 

 the most ample fields of Natural History are presented to the 

 inquirer, the means of exploring them are unfortunately denied 

 to him. Notwithstanding the writer's most anxious exertions 

 to procure the rare specimens (which the sea occasionally 

 yields up to dredge, net, and line) from the fishermen under 

 his own pastoral superintendence, he has almost entirely 

 failed in attaining his purpose, through their utter apathy to 

 everything like a love of the ' unsaleable ' creatures that ' swim 

 the ocean's stream.' " I have no doubt that the experience of 

 several amongst ourselves lias been much the same as that of 

 this clergyman half a century ago — though his case had its 

 own peculiar aggravations. But to return to the Ormiston 

 yew. In both Statistical Accounts this tree is noticed at some 

 length, while the yew at Whittinghame, which is often looked 

 upon as a rival to the Ormiston tree, is mentioned in neither 

 Account. Nor does Loudon include the Whittinghame yew in 

 his long list of remarkable trees, though the Ormiston yew has 

 a paragraph devoted to it. A stranger omission still is that of 

 the late Sir Thomas Dick Lauder, who edited in 1834 ' Gilpin's 

 Forest Scenery,' making many curious and useful additions to 

 that well-known work. Among other remarkable trees, he 

 gives an interesting notice of the Ormiston yew, with detailed 

 measurements of its circumference. Yet the Whittinghame yew 

 is not once referred to by him, though it was only a few miles 

 distant from his own estate of Fountaiuhall. Some days after 

 inspecting the Ormiston tree, I accompanied a friend to Whit- 

 tinghame to see the eucalyptus there growing. This tree was 

 planted as a seedling in 1846, and though cut down nearly to 

 the ground at one time by frost, is now 60 feet high. When at 

 Whittinghame, I made a careful survey of the yew-tree there, 

 while the appearance of the other East Lothian specimen was 

 still fresh in the memory. Although the Whittinghame yew 

 is certainly a very fine old tree, and has also its own historic 

 associations, it did not appear to me to be so stately or so well- 

 proportioned as the Ormiston yew. When the Berwickshire 



