REPOETS OF MEETINGS FOR 1909 29 



charged with being a jDapist, anabaptist, or undutiful subject." 

 At a period when raids were frequent, such Bastles or fortified 

 dwelHngs afforded their inmates not only a sense of security, 

 but also some increase of domestic comfort over that supplied 

 in the ancient Border peles. As an illustration of this, 

 Doddington Bastle may be appropriately cited, as in spite 

 of the fact that a large portion of it has suffered through 

 the disastrous gale of December 1896, enough still remains 

 on which to form a judgment respecting its more modern 

 purpose and plan. Its outline consists of a three-stoi-eyed 

 oblong square to which on the South is attached a projection 

 containing the entrance and staircase. It rises to a height 

 of 36 feet at the top of the North and South walls which 

 are battlemented, and along which run a parapet 3 feet high 

 and a gutter 2 feet wide, arranged so as to allow the water 

 to be conveyed to projecting spouts or gargoyles. Good square 

 masonry occurs in the staircase, angle-quoins, and door and 

 window dressings ; but ill dressed stones from the neighbouring 

 hills make up the outside walls, which being built with an 

 inner and outer face, and filled in without bonding stones, 

 have had subsequently to be buttressed from without. The 

 entrance doorway on the East of the staircase projection has 

 an arched head in a single stone and has been secured by a 

 draw bar, the opening for which is in the South jamb. A 

 circular stairway 8 feet 6 inches in diameter ascends to the 

 roof, communicating with the upper floors. An inner square- 

 headed door leads to the basement, which is lighted by at 

 least three slits, though other openings may be concealed by 

 an added thickness of wall on the North side. At the West 

 end is a large fireplace, in the North jamb of which is an 

 unexplained recess. The first floor has only one fireplace, 

 but is lighted by seven small windows. Its walls have been 

 plastered, but no divisions into apartments have been preserved. 

 The upper storey corresponds in structure and dimensions with 

 the one below, but there are indications of a second fireplace 

 in the West gable, and from this and the height of the roof, 

 which is 12 feet, as well as from the fact that the window 

 openings are grooved for glass, it has been conjectured that 

 it was set apart for the principal domestic apartments. An 



