REPORTS OF MEETINGS FOR 1909 53 



resembling boulder clay, which filled the hollows and river-courses 

 of the older rocks. Overlying that conglomerate there was a 

 great deposit of marls and sandstones, forming the prominent 

 beds of that formation. It was stated that they wei"e admirably 

 exposed in the Tweed from St. Boswells to Rutherford, and that 

 they abounded in fish remains. A thin bed of poi'phyritic lava 

 could be traced from the North down to and across the Tweed, 

 causing the gorge known as Makerstoun Trows — that is, 

 troughs of a very narrow character through which the Tweed, 

 in great depth, rushed with much force and considerable noise. 

 A departed industry in the form of a Lint Mill had been there in 

 operation at one time, and in the museum at Monteviot might be 

 seen an old raggling iron such as had been used in former times in 

 the working of flax. The family name of Rutherford had been 

 traced back in connection with that property to the year 1165, 

 and Rutherfords of that ilk appeared to have ruled over it for 

 some four centuries and a half. But early in the l7th century, 

 by the previous marriage of an heiress of the family, the lands 

 passed to the Stuarts of Traquair, though not without much 

 personal contention and subsequent combats in courts of law. 

 Afterwards there had been various changes of ownership, and 

 ultimately they had come into the hands of the Antrobus family, 

 the present possessors, the immediate owner being Sir Edmund 

 Antrobus, Bart., who was also proprietor in England of that most 

 ancient structure — Stoueheuge. The mansion-house, marked 

 by no special feature, was visible on the South from the railway 

 and the boat-house, and had been occupied for many genera- 

 tions by the successive tenants of the farm, an arable holding 

 of some 1,400 acres. The estate formed part of the parish 

 of Maxton, but according to the new Statistical Account 

 Rutherford was at one time a distinct parish, with a Church 

 and a Hospital of its own. The precise nature of the latter 

 was perhaps uncertain, for these institutions, whether under 

 the name of Hospital, Maison Dieu, or other designation, 

 discharged various functions according to the terms of their 

 foundation. Mr J. J. Vernon, in a learned and interesting- 

 paper read to the Hawick Archaeological Society, stated that 

 these, chiefly pre-Reformation, establishments were founded, 

 some for the sick poor, some for pilgrims and travellers, and some 



