REPORT OF MEETINGS FOR 1904 133 



breathing the freshness of the mountain air, and inhaling 

 the spirit of romance that haunts the solitude, — a lung and 

 heart tonic so restoring that from one of their number, now 

 greeting from across the ocean "the land of the mountain 

 and the flood," there broke forth this tribute to the charm 

 that pervades the scene: — 



" Though your face may change with the changing lights 



And the moods of the hills, St. Mary's, 

 Yon are always the bath of the moorland sprites 



And the cup of the mountain fairies ; 

 And every stone on your misty marge, 



And each wave of your sun-tipped glory, 

 Has woven a word of your fame writ large 



On our Border song and story." 



On the slope above the Loch, but invisible from the road, 

 may be traced the foundations of a church, 

 St. Mary's dedicated to Our Lady, of which mention is 

 Kirk. made in 1275, when Bagimund came from Eome 



to Scotland to collect the tenth ecclesiastical 

 benefices for the Crusades, and regarding which the oldest 

 existing reference is contained in an order by Edward I. in 

 1292, presenting the living to Master Edmund de Letham. 

 The building was burned in 1557 in the course of a clan 

 feud between the Cranstouns and Scotts, but, on Sir Walter's 

 authority, continued to be used as a place of worship during 

 the seventeenth century. Its walls are now almost entirely 

 obliterated, though the burying-ground still serves the purposes 

 of a local cemetery. A. mile further on a modern church 

 belonging to the heirs of the Disruption Fathers was formally 

 opened for worship by the late Dr Thomas Chalmers in 1845, 

 and is now known by the name of Coppercleuch. Beyond it 

 about half a mile the Meggat Water, which has its source 

 in Peeblesshire, empties its waters into the Loch, on whose 

 banks formerly stood Henderland Tower, a Forest fortress, 

 whence was dragged William Cockburn, a notorious free- 

 booter, to be executed at Edinburgh in 1530, by command 

 of James V. 



