NOTES ON CflURCfl AND BAUONY OF LINTON l55 



perished with them," and, when the curtain rises, after the 

 Reformation, Thomas Moffet is acting "reidar at Linton" in 

 1572, with a stipend of 20 merks. Like the vast majority of 

 that class of functionaries, he was probably an old priest. 



It thus appears that, prior to the Reformation, Linton in 

 Teviotdale was an independent rectory, the advowson being 

 vested in the Lords Somerville, and their successors. At 

 Hoselaw, however, in the upper end of the parish, within a 

 mile of England, there was a small chapelry which belonged 

 to the Abbey of Kelso; the "plewlandis of Hoselaw"* being 

 valued, in the rental of that abbey, at 403. The ruins of 

 this chapel, with a small burial ground attached, were still 

 visible in the eighteenth century. To this day the eminence 

 on which it stood bears the name of the Chapel Knowe, 

 while the site is marked by an ancient platanus which grew 

 against the churchj'ard wall. 



Turning to the list of clerj^y who have ministered here 

 since the Reformation, WALTER BALFOUR, last of the old 

 Roman rectors, f conformed in 1560, and enjoyed the somewhat 

 rare distinction of sitting in the First General Assembly, in 

 the Magdalene Chapel. Shortly after the Reformation he 

 retired, and settled in Fife, where he married Elizabeth 

 Balfour, widow of Troylus Grigsoun, burgess in Leslie ; and 

 died, exhorter and reader, at Kinross and Orwell, in 1589. 



JOHN BALFOUR, M.A. (1610-1616) was a graduate of 

 St. Andrews, and a member of the Glasgow Golden Assembly, 



* Liber de Calclion, p. 491. 



fit mast be noted, however, that he has also been claimed by West 

 Linton (or Linton Rotheric), in the deanery of Peebles, without reason, 

 as was supposed at the time the list of clergy, published in a previous 

 volume, was first drawn up, since that was a vicarage, an appanage of 

 the Abbey of Kelso, and this an independent rectory. Cosmo Innes, 

 however, has shown, in his Origines Parochiales, that Walter Balfour, 

 vicar of the other Liuton, was also lessee of the rectorial tithes, which 

 gave him some warrant for describing himself as rector. In the 

 Lesmahago Papers, anno 1556, " Magister Walter Balfour, rector de 

 Lintoun," appears as au auditor. Whichever place claims him, he is 

 scarcely a character to be proud of. Living in an age of sacrilege, 

 evidently he belonged to the too namerous class of ecclesiastics who 

 trafficked in teinds. 



