216 Report of Meetings for 1880, by James Hardy. 



Polydichium aculeatum, wMcli is a very prevalent fern in the 

 East Lothian ravines. The tall woods give shelter to a rookery. 

 Spott House is finely situated, and a charming place. It is 

 founded on rock at the edge of the dean, and in its present state 

 of completeness is not fifty years old, but it incorporates an older 

 mansion, in which tradition reports that Oliver Cromwell slept 

 the night after vanquishing the Scots on the fields below Doon- 

 hill, Sept. 3, 1650. This old house probably represents another, 

 which appears to have been visited by James YI. in February, 

 1595, as he then intended going to Spott and Dunglas.* At 

 Spott House, in December, 1592, the attempt, on the 27th of 

 that month, to surprise James VI. at Holyrood Palace appears 

 to have been planned by Bothwell (Francis Stewart) and his ac- 

 complices.! The laird of Spott, James Douglas, had a principal 

 share in the adventure. The garden was prettily laid out, and 

 well stocked with evergreens, and a variety of healthy growing 

 Coniferse ; especially noteworthy was a curious Larch, which out 

 of a single stem, was divided into three tall full-grown trees ; 

 one ascending from the original stem, the other two forking from 

 a curved branch, which had taken up the growth consequent on 

 some accident to the leading shoot. December's frost, so disas- 

 trous elsewhere, had only singed Aucuba Japonica here, and that 

 not fatally. 



By a winding walk the company proceeded to the top of the 

 Doon-hill, and enjoyed the extensive prospect. A precipitous 

 bank on the N.E. is probably the " Maiden Loup," where three 

 witches, aU of whom perished at the stake, the latest in 1629, 

 according to the Scottish judicial records, held an evening con- 

 vention with Satan. On the eastern slope of the hill stands Little 

 Pinkerton, at which there was formerly a chapel, which was con- 

 stituted into a prebend of the coUegiate church of Dunbar. 

 Edward I., after his first campaign in Scotland, on his return 

 journey to England, stayed the night of Aug. 20, 1296, at Pink- 

 erton.]: One MS. of Fordun states that the first battle of Dun- 

 bar, gained by the English, April 27, 1296, was fought at Spott, 

 so that he rested near the scene of his triumph. Old accounts 

 state that there was a Eoman camp (for so British camps were 



* Calendar of State Papers, Scotland, ii., p. 672. 



f Rob. Jonstoni Hist. Rerum Britan. 



X Hist. Documents, Scotland ii., p. 31. 



