'HA Memoir of the Rec. John Frederic Bigye. 



Cocklaw polo tower ; the cliurclies of Siinonburn, Bellinghani, aud 

 Thorneyburn ; the Northumberland Lakes, dear to botanists aud 

 entomologists ; the whole English Border land, fidl of classic 

 associations. In this country there was no lack of points of 

 interest ; and with excursions like these, involving a sometimes 

 fatiguing day to horse as well as man, but ended by a warm 

 welcome at home, a visit to Stanifordham was a thing to be looked 

 forward to with pleasure, and afterwards to recall a pleasant 

 memory. 



Here then it was that Mr Bigge for 37 years lived a happy 

 and useful life ; with a beautiful church, a comfortable house, a 

 manageable parish, and a sufficient income ; in a district which 

 he knew and loved; in the midst of family and friends, who 

 loved him and recognised his worth ; with the ever increasing 

 love of the country and country objects, which furnished him 

 recreation from more serious work, he glided peacefully and 

 contentedly down the vale of life. Not indeed without his part 

 in the inevitable trials of human life ; one, and a great one, was 

 the disastrous failure of the Northumberland and Durham 

 District Bank, in 1857, disastrous to the district at large, a 

 cause of immense annoyance and loss to himself. Of his large 

 family, six sons and as many daughters, he lost three ; one, his 

 eldest son, died at Ovinghain in infamy ; whilst two little girls, 

 carried off by scarlet fever, lie side by side in Stamfordham 

 churchyard. Of late years, partly from want of time and 

 pressure of other duties, partly from the effect of advancing 

 years, Mr Bigge had greatly curtailed his more distant excur- 

 sions ; always, however, making an endeavour to attend the 

 meetings of the Berwickshire Club. But his own garden and 

 home pursuits still afforded hiui constant enjoyment. There he 

 had gathered together numbers of plants remarkable for their 

 rarity and beauty ; there he could still wander along the banks 

 of the little river Pont, rod in hand, and lure its speckled 

 beauties ; there he still loved to entertain his friends with genial 

 hospitality ; and there, not without earnest preparation for the 

 last great journey of life, he sleeps his long deep sleep in his 

 churchyard, shadowed by his own dear church, and next to the 

 little daughters who preceded him. 



Mr Bigge had felt greatly the death, not long before, of his 

 sister, Mrs David Smith of Edinburgh ; and was not without an 

 idea that he might be carried off in the same way, a feeling which 





