52 REPORTS OF MEETINGS FOR 1909 



noteworthy feature of which was a mound. But proximity to 

 these old rings might be the explanation. The eminence on 

 the right, opposite Makerstoun House, had been considered by 

 some as a strength for the protection of this fort, but by 

 others with greater probability as a Moot Hill — and, indeed, 

 it was still known as the Plea Hill. 



Regarding Rutherford itself, previously unvisited as such, it 



should be stated that for its name various 

 Rutherford, suggestions had been offered. One relied on a 



tradition that Ruther, King of the Scots, on 

 his march with his army against the Britons, was safely 

 guided over the neighbouring ford of the Tweed by a man of 

 distinction on the Borders, who was rewarded by a grant of 

 lands contiguous to the ford, and afterwards known as Ruth- 

 erford. The probability was that this king of uncertain date 

 obtained the assistance of a poor labourer, impressed into the 

 duty and rewarded with a few coins, and thereafter ordered 

 to get out of the way as soon as possible. Another fanciful 

 statement was that in a sharp engagement between Scots and 

 English at some unknown date the English, when crossing 

 the ford, were surprised and defeated by a number of Scots 

 emerging from a place of concealment on the opposite bank, 

 and since known as Scots Hole ; and the wild suggestion had been 

 made that the lands then obtained their present name because 

 the vanquished had cause to " rue the ford " ! A third explan- 

 ation was that the family name was derived from the place ; 

 and Jeffrey, in his History of Roxburghshire, insisted that 

 it was so called from the British words "ruth thir ford," 

 signifying "the ford at the red-coloured land." How far these 

 words might be treated as British needed not to be entered 

 upon, but if correctly translated, then undoubtedly the allega- 

 tion would seem to be well founded, and particularly so if 

 Jeffrey should prove to be correct in his statement that no other 

 ford in the Tweed displayed a bank of this special formation. 

 The reference to the sedimentary rocks marking the river 

 bank led naturally to a short allusion to their geological 

 aspect. According to the Ordnance Gazetteer, nearly one third 

 of this county was made up of the upper Old Red strata, and the 

 oldest member of this formation consisted of a coarse conglomerate 



