398 TRANSACTIONS OF THE [Sess. lxxix. 



or four days thereafter was recommended by them to 

 Herries and other Friends in the Border who got me 

 conveniently lodg'd in a little village on the English side 

 of Tweed called Leronith x ; while I was at dinner at 

 Cornwall 2 with a knott of these Merse Gentlemen five 

 or six days thereafter kynd Heav'n sent me that Dear 

 Creature Barns, from whom I never parted till I left 

 whose wisdome fortitude and zeal that he exerted on all 

 occasions Dean 3 never thinks of without admiration. 

 He told me that he met a Company of Gentlemen who 

 having lost all patience in waiting for the Ladder were 

 retiring to the Town and that with great difficulty he 

 got them perswaded to return back. We were told by 

 severalls at Perth 4 that they met Mr. Forbes making 

 towards the Castle a half mile from the Spot as they were 

 making a Shift for themselves. My Brother told me that 

 some Barbers and others of that gang were forming a 

 Contriveance at their bottle of that sort six or seven 

 months before, but I never heard that It took air among 

 the Whiggs or cou'd observe that they lookt after it with 

 any other air than as a place of importance which they 

 might realy consider as a good prize tho' I had daily the 

 best opportunitys. I din'd the Sunday before at my Lord 

 Ormeystown, smoakt a pipe the same week with Major 

 Aikman, 5 in his Club at the King of France's "dredgy" 6 

 as they call'd it which then they observ'd evry night, 

 and I may add that Bar-on Clerk din'd with me the 

 very day before, who at that time was inseparable from 



1 Leronith. Where ? 



2 Cornwall. Where? Dr. Walter B. Blaikie has given me the 

 following information : — 



" Cornwall, I imagine, is really Cornhill, pronounced Counell or 

 Cornell, a village (near Coldstream) on the English side of the Tweed, 

 but I do not know Leronith. Perhaps a careful scrutiny of the Ordnance 

 Survey Map might show a survival of the name somewhere in the neigh- 

 bourhood of Coldstream. I have, however, little doubt that the word 

 is a mistranscription of Learrnouth, a place a little to the south of 

 Cornhill." 



3 Dean is, I take it, Arthur's cypher designation. 



4 Arthur must have gone with Barns to Perth. Arthur refers to 

 seeing Alexander Stewart " in yr. Grace's service in Perth." (See p. 394.) 



6 Major Aikman. Probably James Aikman of Preston's Regiment. 

 Perhaps related to Aikman the portrait painter (see pedigree table at 

 p. 381). 



6 King of France's " dredgy." Is there a history of this ? 



