Anniversary Address. 3 



The Rev. Thomas Boston, junior, said to be the most eloquent 

 preacher of his age, after Whitefield, was once minister of Oxnam. 

 It grieved several members to see the dilapidated condition of 

 the monument in the churchyard of the Eev. Alexander Colden, 

 the patron and friend of the older Boston, and father of Dr 

 Oadwallader Colden, Governor of New York, a distinguished 

 Botanist and Historian, whose daughter also was a Naturalist. 

 Dr Colden was a correspondent of Linnseus, who has com- 

 memorated him in the genus Coldenia. The heritors have the 

 repair of the tomb under consideration. Mr Simson supplied 

 curious information about various stone and other implements 

 and weapons, as well as of British graves having been disclosed 

 during the cultivation of the land ; and he and I on the day after 

 the Meeting drove through the centre and made a circuit of the 

 eastern part of Oxnam parish, comprehending in our tour the 

 Roman camp at Street House, the W.atling Street, the Standing 

 Stones, and the camps on the peaks of Cunzierton and Oxnam 

 Row hills, picking up a considerable amount of information as 

 we passed along, and enjoying most extensive views from the 

 highest vantage ground. 



At Jedburgh we were fortunate in having obtained Mr Walter 

 Laidlaw's aid to copy the old inscriptions in the abbey and town 

 as well as in the neighbourhood for some distance round, in- 

 cluding the hitherto unintelligible inscription on the Roman 

 slab, preserved in Jedburgh Abbey. A cast of this inscription 

 was taken at the instance of the Marquis of Lothian, and sent to 

 Dr Bruce of Newcastle, who was not only able to decipher it, but 

 has also favoured the Club with a paper on it, as well as a cut 

 at his own expense ; and this with two other illustrations and 

 engravings belonging to the Antiquarian Society of Newcastle, 

 has been inserted in an Appendix to the Club's number for 1884. 

 When staying for the evening with Sheriff Russell at Jed-bank, 

 I pointed out to Miss Russell the desirableness of the Club's 

 having drawings of the several bronze and other antiquities pre- 

 served in the Jedburgh Museum ; these she has since finished in 

 a highly satisfactory manner, and they can be brought forward 

 at any time when the funds admit of it to illustrate the "Pro- 

 ceedings." I also procured measurements and information about 

 a number of Red Deer's Antlers, and crania of Jios primigenius 

 that had been disinterred in the circuit round Jedburgh, some 

 of them at present in the Museum, and others in private possession. 



