28 Report of the Meetings for 1892. 



from Selkirk, the party crossed Tweed by an elegant stone 

 bridge, of which the foundation stone was laid in 1831 by Sir 

 Walter Scott — his last public act. Below Ettrick Foot, and on 

 the right bank of Tweed, lie the lands of Faldonside, for which 

 Sir Walter was negotiating at between £30,000 and £40,000, till 

 within a year of the crash that made him bankrupt ! 



Instead of following the flow of Ettrick, we now ascended the 

 vale of Tweed, soon reaching Eink Camp, which was inspected 

 with keen enthusiasm. Its inner ring is an ellipsis, measuring 

 about 270 X 180 feet, and encircled by a rampart 12 feet high, 

 of large stones. Between this rampart and the next is a fosse 

 over 30 feet in width, and 20 feet at its deepest. Outside the 

 second rampart, to the west, a crescent bastion, at its widest 

 nearly 100 feet, has been pushed out to strengthen the fort. 

 South of the Camp, on the hill side, and now protected by 

 plantation, is a bit of the ancient roadway known as the 

 Catrail, widened and entrenched for the purposes of defence. 



The road from Eink crosses, at right angles, the Catrail as it 

 descends the hill Itefore crossing Tweed at Howden Path. A 

 few minutes brought the party to Fairnilee. the picturesque 

 ruin of a comparatively modern house in which the old tower is 

 incorporated. From middle of 15th century till close of 17th, 

 lands were possessed by Kers, after whom came the Eutherfords, 

 and finally the Pringles of Haiuing. Here was bora in 1713 

 Alison Eutherford, better known as Mrs Cockburn, authoress of 

 that version of the " Flowers of the Forest," beginning — 



" I've seen the smiling of Fortune beguiling," 



a song which inspired one of Burns's earliest eflorts, "I dreamt 

 I lay," — composed in his seventeenth year. Mrs Cockburn, 

 who was a great beauty, preserved, through many heavy 

 trials, uncommon brightness of spirit and gaiety of heart. She 

 had light auburn hair, the gold of which was unsilvered at 

 eighty— a year before her death. Her niece Elizabeth, also a 

 poetess, becoming Mrs Walter Scott, entertained Burns at old 

 Wauchope House, visited by the Club two months ago. 



On the opposite side of the Tweed is Yair (built 1789) — 

 residence of the Pringles of Whytbank — heirs-male of the 

 Hoppringles of that ilk, Scott's 



" Long-descended Lords of Yair." 



Patrick Euthven, a royalist laird of Yair, was created Lord 



