of the principal annual event of the town, the “Common Riding,” the occasion on which the officials rode round the boundaries.  There was an artificial mound in the town called the “Mote-Hill,” formerly used by the Druids.  It was to the top of this hill the cornet and his followers ascended at sunrise on the day of the festival, after which they adjourned to a platform specially erected in the town, to sing the Common Riding Song.  We could not obtain a copy of this, but we were fortunate in obtaining one for the next town we were to visit—­Langholm—­which proved to be the last on our walk through Scotland.  From what we could learn, the ceremony at Hawick seemed very like the walking of the parish boundaries in England, a custom which was there slowly becoming obsolete.  We could only remember attending one of these ceremonies, and that was in Cheshire.  The people of the adjoining parish walked their boundaries on the same day, so we were bound to meet them at some point en route, and a free fight, fanned by calling at sundry public-houses, was generally the result.  The greatest danger-zone lay where a stream formed the boundary between the two parishes, at a point traversed by a culvert or small tunnel through a lofty embankment supporting a canal which crossed a small valley.  This boundary was, of course, common to both parishes, and representatives of each were expected to pass through it to maintain their rights, so that it became a matter of some anxiety as to which of the boundary walkers would reach it first, or whether that would be the point where both parties would meet.  We remembered coming to a full stop when we reached one entrance to the small tunnel, while the scouts ascended the embankment to see if the enemy were in sight on the other side; but as they reported favourably, we decided that two of our party should walk through the culvert, while the others went round by the roads to the other end.  There was a fair amount of water passing through at that time, so they were very wet on emerging from the opposite end, and it was impossible for the men to walk upright, the contracted position in which they were compelled to walk making the passage very difficult.  What would have happened if the opposition had come up while our boundary walkers were in the tunnel we could only surmise.

Hawick is in Roxburghshire and was joined on to Wilton at a house called the Salt Hall, or the “Saut Ha’,” as it is pronounced in Scotch, where a tragedy took place in the year 1758.  The tenant of the Hall at that time was a man named Rea, whose wife had committed suicide by cutting her throat.  In those days it was the custom to bury suicides at the dead of night where the laird’s lands met, usually a very lonely corner, and a stake was driven through the body of the corpse; but from some cause or other the authorities allowed “Jenny Saut Ha’,” as she was commonly called, to be buried in the churchyard.  This was considered by many people to be an outrage, and the body was