Statements concerning Sir Walter Scott. 283 



nor his being indifferent to the classical remains of Italy, 

 prevented his being mo^t anxious to acquire the well-known 

 altar dedicated to Silvanus by Caius Arrius Domitianus, found 

 at the Eed Abbey Stead, at the foot of the Eildon hills. 



The proprietor would not part with it, and when the 

 estate of Drygrange was sold, the altar travelled with the 

 family to Eoss Priory, on Loch Lomond. 



The other altars from Newstead, now in the Museum in 

 Edinburgh, are said to have been found in making the 

 railway about 18-18. Lockhart remarks Sir Walter's anxiety 

 to identify his daughter-in-law's property of Lochore with 

 the Urbs Orrea of the Eomans. 



Dr Collingwood Bruce regretted, in one of his Ehind 

 Lectures, that Sir Walter should have built into his court- 

 yard wall, exposed to the weather, the stone which is the 

 only record of the Twenty-third Legion having been in 

 Britain. The number is partly gone, but the well-known 

 name of the legion, Primigenia, is legible. It is only 

 presumed that it comes from the neighbouring station of 

 Newstead. 



But the altar of Arrius Domitianus is perhaps better 

 where it is, as long as it is distinctly understood to have 

 come from Newstead. 



The dedication to Silvanus, the god of woods and hunting, 

 has a certain local character, for the kennels of the 

 fox-hounds are even now within two or three miles of 

 Newstead. 



It shows how little one should take things for granted 

 that none of the notices of the Silvanus altar, that I have 

 seen, give the name of the centurion correctly. Of course 

 it would be obvious to a specialist in Latin inscriptions that 

 CAERIUS stood for Caius Arrius ; but until Dr Hardy 

 pointed this out, and that not in print, I do not think it 

 was to be found anywhere. The C is not exactly an initial 

 in our sense, but is the recognised sign for Caius. 



It is worth pointing out that while Sir Walter's connecting 

 the Yarrow Standing-stones with the well-known Scott duel 

 might throw a doubt on the tradition that Ker of Oessford 

 was killed at the Standing-stone on the Abbotsford property, 

 Lockhart says he had repeatedly heard him tell how his 

 father had shown it him as a boy — "Something in your 



