Report of Meetings for 1880, by James Hardy. 285 



"Left Newcastle early and rode over a fine country to Hexham 

 to breakfast, from Hexham to Wardrew tbe celebrated Spa 

 where we slept." It was at Wardrew that Sir Walter Scott first 

 met with his future spouse. A pane of glass in one of the win- 

 dows, with Sir Walter's name upon it, said to have been written 

 by himseK, was taken out by Mr Hodgson Hinde, when he rented 

 the house, owing to the annoyance caused by the hundreds of 

 strangers who visited the place to see the writing.*" 



The "Popping-Stone," the scene of his courtship, was duly 

 visited. He has sketched it in the Introduction to " The Bridal 

 of Triermain." 



" Come, rest th.ee on thy wonted seat ; 

 Moss'd is the stone, the turf is green," &c. 



A modern piece of superstition is developed here. The stone 

 is now only one half its original size, portions of it having been 

 chipped off by foolish visitors, under the belief that when placed 

 under the pillows of the unmarried of the fair sex, dreams of 

 their future partners will be vouchsafed to them.f 



Not very long since a remnant of well- worship survived here. 

 "Within my own recollection," writes the Eev. G. Eome Hall, 

 "the yearly pilgrimage to Gilsland Wells (there are both a 

 chalybeate and a sulphur medicinal water here) on the Sunday 

 after old Midsummer Day, called the Head Sundaj', and the Sun- 

 day after it, was a very remarkable survival of the ancient cultus 

 of primitive times. Hundreds, if not thousands, used to assemble 

 there from all directions by rail when that was available, and by 

 vehicles and on foot otherwise. They were wont to walk or drive 

 annually at the summer solstice, even from North Tynedale, the 

 neighbourhood of Wark and Birtley, to Fourstones, and thence 

 by railway to liose Hill Station, that they might take, uncon- 

 sciously, it may be hoped, their part in a heathen solem- 

 nity."t 



" The Shawes," the name of the hotel, was a farm in the manor 

 of Triermaine, in 1621 and 1633. Wardrew was a farm in 1633.§ 

 Edmund Carrock was tenant of Shawes, 4th Oct., 1609, being one 

 of those who resigned to his lord the claim of tenant right, 



* Jenkinson's Guide, p. 61. t Ibid, p. 68. 



X On Modern Survivals of Ancient Well-worship in North Tynedale, 

 Archseolog. ^liana, N. S. viii., p. 72. 



§ Household Book of Lord William Howard, pp. 155, 182, 279, 288-9. 



