90 On Bcm.ch esbw, Rule Water. By Walter Deans. 



labour, kindly treated, and shortly after put on hoard a ship and 

 sent home. He did not, however, return to the banks and braes 

 of Bonchester, where he spent the happy days of youth, but 

 afterwards lived and died in the Isle of Jersey. 



Walter Scott of Bonchester died in 1743, and left a large family 

 of sons and daughters. His eldest son, Walter, dying, the estate 

 was inherited by the second son, Thomas, who was the last Scott 

 of Bonchester. Thomas Scott appears to have been a business 

 man in his day. Under him, Bonchester was greatly improved 

 by fencing and running the marches ; for at that period scarcely 

 any of the lands of the Parish were enclosed. Marches between 

 proprietors were often constructed of a low feal dyke, and some- 

 times a " loaning " was the march. As the district from repeated 

 cutting of timber for fuel, was now getting bare of natural wood, 

 Mr Scott conceived the idea of making a nursery for the raising 

 of young trees. He built a cottage on Bonchester haugh, on the 

 march between Bonchester and Langraw, and enclosed two acres 

 of ground for the purpose. Mr Scott also for some time farmed 

 Maxside, and was also factor for Mr Lyle of Stonedge. Mr Scott 

 at a later period fell into difficulties, and was obliged to sell Bon- 

 chester, which was purchased by Mr Oliver of Dinlaybyre, who 

 at the same time was proprietor of Weens. The then Duke of 

 Buccleuch, out of personal regard for Mr Scott, as one of his own 

 kin and name, kindly gave him Bowhill farm to live in, where 

 he ended his days. He died at the age of 78, and was interred 

 in Hobkirk Churchyard. A small stone was erected to his 

 memory, and that of his wife, Hanna Barnet, and also of a 

 daughter named Nelly, who died young. He had also a daughter 

 married to Dr Lorraine of the Glasgow Academy. 



Mr Scott had also a younger brother, the Eev. William Scott, 

 who in 1764 succeeded the Eev. William Turnbull in the ministry 

 of the parish of Abbotrule. After the suppression of that parish 

 in 1777, Mr Scott was translated to Southdean in 1785, and died 

 in 1800. From a poem to his memory by Thomas Oliver, a 

 rhymer at Southdean, Mr Scott appears to have been seized with 

 his last illness in the pulpit : — 



" I saw him from the kirk descend, 

 And in five hours his life did end." 



A monument was erected to his memory in Southdean Church- 

 yard. He wrote an account of the Parish of Southdean, which 

 is contained in Sinclair's " Statistical Account," Yol, xti,, p, 67, 



