xvi INTEODUCTION. 



the Eoe/ the Wolf,^ and the Wild Boar,^ whilst on many 

 of the inland waters the Beaver^ still constructed his 

 dam. The invaders are credited with burning immense 

 tracts of these woods to clear the ground, and to enable 

 them to carry on a more successful warfare with the 

 native Britons — the Otadini — whom they could not follow 

 into their sylvan fastnesses, as well as to drive off the 

 numerous Wolves and Wild Boars with which the country 

 was infested. 



After the final retirement of the Eomans in 426 A.D., the 

 region was successively ravaged by the Saxons and the 

 Danes, who seem to have completed the destruction which 

 their predecessors had begun, for in the time of William the 

 Lion (1165-1214) the woods had almost wholly disappeared, 

 and those which remained were confined to the sheltered 

 valleys and the banks of the rivers.^ 



These great changes in the face of the country would 

 doubtless be followed by corresponding alterations in the 

 fauna of the district ; the various species, to whose welfare 



1 This beautiful animal was found in the country until a comparatively recent 

 period. In a lease of the " landys of Brockholl, Heruode, and Denewod," 

 granted to Thomas Atkynson in 1429-30, the "venyson" is reserved.— (Priory 

 of Coldingham, Surtees Soc.,'p. 105.) Several places in the Lammermuirs have 

 derived their names from the Roe, amongst which may be mentioned Eaecleugh- 

 head, in the parish of Langton, and Rawburn (Roeburn), in the parish of Cran- 

 shaws. 



2 See "History of the Wolf in Scotland," by Mr, James Plardy ; Hist. Ber. 

 Nat. Club, vol. iv. pp. 289-292. 



3 See the old Stat. Account of Scot., vol. v. p. 88, and vol. vi. pp. 322-23 — 

 also the Swintons of that Ilk, by Mr. Campbell-Swinton of Kimmerghame, 1883, 

 pp. 1, 2. That the Wild Boar was found in the neighbourhood of Swinton in 

 olden times there can be little doubt. A field adjoining the village is known 

 by the name of " The Sow Mire" to this day. 



* Castor europceiis. There is indubitable evidence of the existence of the 

 Beaver in Berwickshire in ancient times, for, in draining Middlestots Bog on 

 the estate of Kimmerghame, in October 1818, its remains were found imbedded 

 partly in the marsh and partly in a layer of peat-moss. See Neill in Edin. Phil. 

 Journ., i. p. 84; and in Wern., iii. p. 216; also Milne in Essay on the Geology 

 of Berwickshire, p. 229 (Dr. Johnston's ms. Notes). 



•'' Carr's History of Coldingliam Priory, p. 27. 



