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From 1791 to 1883 there were the Russells, father and son,—the Reverend Dr. Robert Russell and the Reverend Dr. James Russell, whose names were household words far beyond the bounds of Yarrow, and at whose manse old and young, rich and poor, were equally made welcome. And after them came the Reverend Dr. Borland, who died in 1912, and whose "Raids and Reivers" is a Border classic. It is a remarkable record, and a wonderful testimony to the pure air of Yarrow. During his long life Dr. Robert Russell never spent a single day in bed, nor until three days before his death was he ever prescribed for by a doctor.
Yarrow Kirk was built in 1640, and the first minister of the Parish after the Revolution was the Reverend John Rutherford, maternal great-grandfather of Sir Walter Scott. Dr. James Russell gives a quaint account of the church as it was in 1826, in the time of his father. "The interments," he says, "which had taken place in the course of nearly two hundred years, and the wish for proximity to Church walls, had had the effect of raising the ground of the graveyard around the church considerably above its level. In front, the earth outside was two feet, and at the corner of the aisle fully four feet higher. In consequence, the lower walls were covered with a green damp, and the rain water flowed into the passages. In winter the water froze, and my father used to say that he often got a slide to the pulpit." This matter, however, was remedied in 1826, when many improvements were made in and around the church. One improvement which Dr. Russell mentions had to do with the shepherds' dogs, which then invariably accompanied their masters to church—a practice which I think died out but recently. "There were no doors on the seats," says Dr. Russell, "and nothing but a narrow deal in each as a footboard, and no separation below between them. The planking on the passages was very deficient, and a great deal of the earthen floor was thus exposed, and it can easily be imagined that when the shepherds from Ettrick, as well as from Yarrow, came to church, each shepherd as regularly accompanied by his dog as encased in his plaid—no matter what the weather or the season—what frequent rows there were. On the slightest growl they all pricked up their ears. If a couple of them fell out and showed fight, it was the signal for a general mêlée. The rest that were prowling about, or half asleep at their masters' feet, rushed from their lairs, found a way through below the pews, and among the feet of the occupants, and raised literally such a dust as fairly enveloped them. Then the strife waxed fierce and furious, the noise became deafening, the voice of the minister was literally drowned, and he was fain to pause, whether in preaching or in prayer. Two or three shepherds had to leave their places and use their nibbies unmercifully before the rout was quelled, and the service of the sanctuary resumed." Such a scene as the above was quite an ordinary occurrence in a country church in Scotland, early in the nineteenth century—and in remote districts even later than that; minister and congregation were accustomed to it, and took it as a matter of course. The shepherd's dogs could not be left behind to their own devices; and it was a matter of necessity that their master should go to church. There was no more to be said, not even when the dogs (as they often did) with long-drawn howls joined in the singing of the psalms. And when the benediction was pronounced, (which "to cheat the dowgs," was always done with the congregation seated,) then, at the first movement after it, a perfect storm of barking broke out as the dogs poured out of the building ahead of the people.
Just below Yarrow Church are the ruins—I think not much more than the foundations—of Deuchar tower, a Scott stronghold, perhaps, like so many others, or maybe a holding of some descendent of the Outlaw Murray. And hard by Deuchar Mill is the picturesque old bridge with its broken arch stretched, like the stump of a maimed arm, towards the farther shore of Yarrow. It is a bridge that dates from about the year 1653. The burgh records of Peebles for that year show that the magistrates then ordained "that all in the town who have horses shall send the same for a. day, to carry lime for the said brig, under a penalty of forty shillings." That bridge stood till 1734, when the south arch was wrecked by a great flood. To restore the arch was a task at that time beyond the means of the district, and for some years those who lived on the south side of Yarrow and who wished to attend Yarrow Church, could do so only at the cost of wading the water, a feat in flood time impossible, and in the winter season a trial to be endured with difficulty even by the most hardy. The dead, in many instances, could not be buried beside their friends in the old churchyard; children born in parts of the parish south of Yarrow could be baptised only at uncertain times and after indefinite delay; and marriages frequently had to be postponed.
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Finally, of the money required for repair of the bridge, owing to various circumstances only the half could be raised, and the arch put in after a delay of several years was of such peculiar construction, and so steep and causeway-like on the south side that it was not without difficulty that even an empty cart could cross. "Besides," says Dr. Russell, "there was little earth on the stones that formed the arch to steady and protect it." Nevertheless, it held together for the best part of a century, and then, suddenly, it collapsed one winter's afternoon, just after the roadman's cart had crossed. A new bridge had been erected just opposite the church, and no farther attempt was made to repair the old one. There it stands, a pathetic and picturesque memorial of old days.
