242 KEPORT OF MEETINGS FOR 1908 



splendour of early summer. The forest trees had not yet 

 assumed their richest verdure, but with the exception of 

 the Ash appeared in freshest habit, displaying a wealth of 

 shading which would exhaust the resources of the most skilful 

 brushman. The river Tweed was running low for the season, 

 a boy of school-age having gained midstream as he plied 

 the gentle art, and laboured to lure the wary yellow-fin 

 from his retreat beneath the shadow of the overhanging 

 bridge. Kelso was in a common-place mood, Friday being 

 its market-day, and yet in its completed Town-house 

 afforded proof of progress and prosperity. The route lay 

 Eastward along Bridge Street and the Horse Market, skirting 

 the grounds of Broomlands and Hendersyde, and in a short 

 space introducing the party to the vale of the Eden. About 

 one mile from Kelso, on the South of the road, stands a hand- 

 some obelisk to the memory of James Thomson, 

 Ednam. the son of a former minister of Ednara, and 



author of the Seasons and Eule Britannia. In 

 his diary of a visit to Tweedside in 1834, John Trotter Brockett, 

 the younger, of Newcastle, narrates that in the public-house 

 of Ednam, " where the neighbouring noblemen and gentry 

 formerly held the poet's anniversary," he and his father drank 

 to his memory, while a party of Borderers "were celebrating 

 his birth in Kelso by a dinner", — so real and reverent was 

 the regard in which the inhabitants of his native village held 

 him. On the West of the road was seen the race-course, 

 whose handsome stand, on the authority of the same diarisi, 

 was constructed- "in imitation of that of Newcastle." 

 Happily there was little dust to soil the hedgerows, or obscure 

 the outlook, so that the prepossessing hamlet of Ednam, with its 

 old brewery house, mill and sanctuary appeared to advantage 

 as the party approached it. At the Manse the carriages drew 

 up, and the members were received by Rev. J. Burleigh and 

 Mrs Burleigh, accompanied by Mr T. D. Crichton Smith, Provost 

 of Kelso and agent for Sir Richard Waldie Griffith, Bart, 

 of Hendersyde. Half-an-hour was allowed to inspect the 

 enlarged burial ground and recently renovated Church, in 

 which the minister had very kindly arranged an exhibition 

 of relics, among which must be noticed two Communion cups 

 (1738), a flagon, bearing the inscription "To the Kirk of 



