180 THE BORDER ANGLER. 



Scotus, who squabbled with St. Thomas Aquinas about 

 the Immaculate Conception, and Jenny Geddes, whose 

 stool, aimed at the head of the clergyman who dared 

 to read the service of the Church of England in Edin- 

 burgh, gave a mortal blow to Prelacy in Scotland. 

 Episcopalian slanderers have alleged that Jenny was 

 but too familiar with the ecclesiastical stool to which 

 the cognomen of " cutty" is prefixed; but however 

 that may be, Dunse is proud of her. The town has two 

 excellent inns and several second-rate ones. 



From Preston Bridge, the nearest point to Dunse, 

 down to Chi rn side, the Whitadder is a good deal fished, 

 chiefly by local anglers ; but that it has abundance of 

 trout will be demonstrated to any one who happens to 

 be on its banks in April or May, when a " take" comes 

 on. The trout, for the rest of the Whitadder, below 

 this point, are on the whole larger than in the upper 

 portions ; and fly-fishing may be practised a week or 

 two earlier in the season. It is equally adapted for all 

 kinds of angling. At Chirnside, which is a station on 

 the Dnnse branch from the North British, there is a 

 comfortable village inn. A paper-mill here, however, 

 spoils the fishing somewhat for a couple of miles, and 

 the angler following the river need not grudge an 

 hour or two to take a peep at Ninewells, the birth- 

 place of David Hume, and where he sometimes stayed 

 after he had acquired fame. (Some of his comical 

 hoaxes and jeux d' esprit, addressed to his friends in 

 London all the more comical as coming from such a 

 philosopher are dated from Ninewells. He was one 

 of the Berwickshire Homes, but altered his name to 

 make it accord with the border pronunciation, for with 



