Anniversary Address. 255 



in their different seasons, the woodlands in which rare 

 birds nest, or in which plants of uncommon species may be 

 discovered. Information of all sorts and kinds is accumu- 

 lated in the pages of our Journal — records of immense local 

 value, and traditions of great interest ; and it is evident our 

 Club has the means of assisting, or laying the foundation, 

 as the case may be, of that which every county in England 

 and Scotland should possess — a good County History. 



In Northumberland, as I daresay most of us are aware, a 

 great effort is now being made to continue the splendid 

 work of the late Rev. John Hodgson, and give to the other 

 parts of the county, that he did not live to complete, a 

 history as exhaustive and reliable as the volumes that have 

 made his name prominent among county historians, and 

 the various fields into which our records travel, the diflferent 

 sources of information we possess are a priceless treasure in 

 the hands of those charged with such an undertaking. The 

 valuable papers on Natural History, Botany, Geology, 

 Marine Algae, Ornithology, the dift'erent Anticjuities that 

 have been found, the notices of Places and ancient Families, 

 the abstracts from original Cartularies of Abbeys, the 

 descriptions of Churches, Castles, and ruins, the Meteor- 

 ological Observations that have been taken, the carefully 

 recorded Rainfall that has been supplied ; — all these, and 

 many more I could name, are matej'ial ready to the hand of 

 our editor, and doubtless will greatly assist in enriching 

 the pages of the new county History of Northumber- 

 land. 



Roxburghshire — thanks to the labours of the late Mr 

 Jeffrey — has its Annals recorded, though I believe new and 

 valuable light thrown on many places and persons by the 

 investigations of Dr Hardy, and papers communicated to 

 the Club, would render a new edition of that work far 

 more correct and exhaustive. 



A quarter of a century ago, Dr Wm. Chambers published 

 his History of Peeblesshire, and gave to his native county an 

 important and interesting contribution to Scottish letters. 



