"Fierce as the wolf they rushed to seize their prey:
The day was all their night, the night their day."
It is to be regretted that so few of the dozens of clan-strengths which at one time studded the district are any longer in evidence. Hartsgarth, Roan, (so named from the French Rouen), Redheugh, Mangerton—"Kinmont Willie's" Keep—Syde—"He is weel kenned Jock o' the Syde," Copshaw Park—the abode of "little Jock Elliot"—Westburnflat—an "Old Mortality" name—Whithaugh, Clintwood, Hillhouse, Peel, and Thorlieshope, have mostly all disappeared since Scott's day. A generation more utilitarian in its tastes has arisen, and the stones taken to set up dykes and fill drains. Near the junction of the Liddel and Hermitage stood the strongly posted Castle of the "Lords of Lydal," and the important township of Castleton—not unlike the Roxburghs between Tweed and Teviot; and, like them also, both have long since passed from the things that are. Only the worn pedestal of its "mercat-cross" and a lone kirkyard have been left to tell the tale. Two miles farther down is the village of Newcastleton, formerly Copshawholm, planned by the "good Duke Henry" in 1793, a rising summer resort with a population of about a thousand.
We cannot quit Liddesdale without recalling that this is "Dandie Dinmont's" Country. In writing "Guy Mannering" Scott drew largely from his earlier experiences amongst the honest-souled store-farmers and poetry-loving peasants of Liddelside. At Millburn, on the Hermitage, he enjoyed the hospitality of kindly Willie Elliot, who stood for the "great original" of "Dandie Dinmont."
THE END.
PRINTED AND BOUND BY PERCY LUND, HUMPHRIES AND CO., LTD., THE COUNTRY PRESS, BRADFORD; AND 3, AMEN CORNER, LONDON, E.C.
Transcriber's Note:
Minor spelling and typographical errors have been corrected without note. The missing Plate number for Plate 11 has been re-instated.