REPORT OP MEETINGS FOR 1904 lOd 



The members assembled at Kirknewton Station, where 



they were joined by the President and Rev. 

 Kirk- Morris Piddock, incumbent of the parish, who 



newton. had kindly oflFered his assistance as guide to 



the party. Moving off in the direction of the 

 village — which is situated among a few trees at the base of 

 conical hills, near the junction of the waters of the Colledge 

 and the Glen, to the South of which rise the Newton Tors, 

 and to their rear the huge bulk of Cheviot itself — the members 

 set foot on a pastoral district, now quiet and peaceful, but 

 once the scene of inroads and devastation by Scottish raiders, 

 as is vouched for by Sir Robert Bowes' report on the state 

 of the Borders in 1550. Life then would be insecure and 

 precarious, but now it is tranquil and unmolested, the even 

 tenor of its course being evidenced by tombstones in the 

 churchyard recording the names of parishioners who had 

 reached the hoary age of ninety-seven, one hundred and two, 

 and even one hundred and nine years. 



Hard by stands the parish church, a modern structure, 



built on the site of a Norman edifice — a buttress 

 Church and foundations of which were laid bare during 



of St. recent excavations — and dedicated to St. Gregory. 



Gregory. It is interesting to recall its historial antecedents. 



Edwin, King of Northumbria, married in 625 

 Ethelburga of Kent, the daughter of Ethelbert, its first 

 Christian king. In her train there followed to Yeavering, 

 where the court was held, her chaplain, Paulinus, lately 

 consecrated Bishop of York. At the date of his marriage 

 Edwin was a heathen, but in the course of a few years he 

 embraced Christianity, and was baptized by Paulinus, along 

 with a number of his nobles. Six years later he was overcome 

 by Penda, King of Mercia, and died at Hatfield, near Don- 

 caster, in consequence of which disaster his Queen and her 

 chaplain fled, and the kingdom was divided between two 

 apostate princes, Christianity the while being stamped out 

 throughout Northumbria. During his reign, however, shelter 

 had been afforded in Scotland to St. Oswald, a fugitive of 

 royal lineage, who in lona had been taught the Christian 

 faith ; and on the defeat of Caedwalla, the Welsh monarch 

 who aided Penda in the overthrow of Edwin, he was duly 



