Report of Meetings for 1889. By l)r. J. Hardy. 47o 



For the day, Mrs Johnston had courteously placed her pony carriage at 

 our service, and with her nephew as driver, and the Rev. Alexander Wilson 

 as director, the line of country between Saughtree and Kielder Castle was 

 prospected. 



During the early part of the journey, Thorlieshope lay on one side of 

 the Liddel, -whose banks here crowned with a plantation, show considerable 

 steep marly and rocky cliffs, where the Kestrel and an Owl (species not 

 stated) nidificate. About a mile up, the ruins of Hudshouse Tower, over- 

 grown with nettles, lie between the road and the river. 



At a point about l£ miles from Saughtree, near where Caldron Burn 

 joins the Liddel, are the two British Camps, visited by the Club on the 

 subsequent clay. In the old Statistical Account, vol. xvi., p. 8i, these two 

 round-abouts are noticed, and like others in the parish, are " commonly 

 called Picts Works." Hereabouts the first traces of the Catrail can be 

 observed. The Railway cuts right through it here. The carriage having 

 been sent on to Muirdykes, after passing through the railway arch, the 

 Catrail or " Piks' Dike," as it is here called, was visible, consisting of a 

 middle earthen rampart flanked by two ditches, the ditches having a well 

 formed elevated outer edge. It is much cut up here by deep old roadways 

 hollowed out with water-runs. A burn crosses it here. With the Catrail 

 on our right, following a sheep-track we went straight across the grassy 

 moors, which lie on a comparatively level platform sloping up to the 

 encircling back hills, to Worniscleugh, a distance from the turnpike of 

 about I3 miles. 



It was desirable to mark the constituents of the Liddesdale grassy moors 

 and bogs, but we had to push on too rapidly for a thorough analysis. 

 Sometimes the pastures are much roughened with " Bulls' faces," (Aira 

 cwspitosa). Sheep's fescue (Festuca ovina), Rough fescue (F. duriuscula), 

 Spring Grass (Anthoxanthum), Soft Grass (Holcus mollis), and (Poa annua), 

 Avena pratensis, and Briza media were more or less prevalent ; with the 

 usual accompaniments of boggy soils, Rushes, Sprits, and Scirpi. The 

 peaty soil was occupied by Molinia cnerulea (Purple Melic), called here, 

 " Fly Bent." It makes good hay, say the shepherds, but it requires to he 

 cut and won when at the freshest. At Milk hope it was called " Fleeing 

 Bent ; " and there, as a pasture grass, was reckoned good for a while, but 

 it dies too soon. There is much of it " in Reedwater head," and here 

 again it comes in behind Peel Fell, the last of the Cheviots. Liddesdale 

 and Kidland coincide in naming Luzula pilosa, Heart or Hart-crops. This 

 is one of the firstlings of the year, and if it springs early, it announces a 

 year of grass. If a Cheviot ewe in April can find to eat in her pasture 

 three " heart-crops," she will be able to bring up her lamb, not exactly on 

 it, but on the grasses that rise simultaneously with it in forwardness ; and 

 if there are no " heart-crops," the season is unpromising, and the newly 

 yeaned lamb is unlikely to live, as the mother will have no milk. Luzula 

 comjesta did not appear to be tasted by sheep. There were plots of 

 Eriophorum or " Moss-crops ; " Deer's Hair (Eleocharis caispitosa) was 

 plentiful; but Nardus stricta (Black Bent), requiring harder and drier 

 ground, was not so common. The not very moist pastures were regularly 



