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ted age. Lately there were 6 men living at the fame time, within fifty yards of one another, in the old town of Peebles, whofe ages together amounted to 5:8 years, and who, feveral d of them, died near 100 years old. The people are regular in their attendance on the inftitutions of religion, fober, peaceable, and virtuous; fo that, in the memory of the oldest perfon living, no native of Peebles has either been banished, or fuffered capital punishment. In the way in which holidays of human institution are now observed in Europe, it is of advantage to industry, to virtue, and to religion itself, that we have fo few of them in Scotland. In every age and country, the Sabbath has been, and ever must be, the great fupport of religion and of virtue among mankind. Nothing has so much hurt the devout sanctification of that holy day in other countries, as men's being accustomed to employ one part of a holiday in devotion, and the other in diverfion: And nothing has tended more to preserve a due obfervance of the Sabbath, a reverence of God, and veneration for religion and its ordinances in Scotland, than this, that our holidays are mostly obferved with the fame religious fanctity as the Sabbath,

Stipend, Poor, Schools, &c.-The church, which is elegant and substantial, ornamental to the town, and commodious for the parish, was finished in 1783. And the manfe was built in 1770. The ftipend is 1200 1. Scots, and 501. Scots for communion elements. The glebe contains 6 acres. The Duke of Queensberry, as Earl of March, is patron. The poor have no regular fupport but from the intereft of between 400 1. and 500l. Sterling in the management of the kirk sesfion, the collections at the church doors on Sabbath, and the fmall fums arifing from the use of the pall and hearse, amounting to about 601. Sterling yearly: Befides what the magif mates give to indigent perfons from the revenues of the town,

and

and which they justly vary as the exigencies of the times require. As the burgh is the greatest part of the parish, the magiftrates and council have always appointed schoolmasters for the use of the whole parish; one for teaching the Grammar, another the English school, and have provided them with proper houses and falaries. Private fchools alfo have always existed, and of late have become rivals for fame of education with the public ones. All the mafters are able, and all of them are emulous, which to make the beft scholars. At thefe schools no fewer than 250 children are at prefent educated, many of them from different parts of the kingdom, and who, for boarding and clothing, bring into the town annually above 10001. Sterling. Poor children are educated by the kirk-feffion from the poor's funds, and no part of them is more properly applied. The institution of parochial schools is to the honour, as well as the utility of Scotland. It shows the wifdom and patriotism of our ancestors in a high degree. At thefe neceffary and useful little feminaries of literary and religious knowledge, established by law in every parish, many have received the first principles of literature, who have become ornaments to their country, and bleffings to mankind. What a pity is it, that in a country of increased, and of yearly increafing opulence and expenfe, the falaries of fo useful a class of men are not increased in proportion!

Modern Improvements in Trade and Manufacture, &c.Formerly Peebles was fupported chiefly by the houses and burgh acres belonging to the burgeffes, by their merchandife and their trade, and by the many valuable commonties granted by the kings of Scotland to the burgh for its loyalty and good fervices. Now, improvements begin to be carried on upon a larger fcale. Of late years, about fifty houses bave been built or thoroughly repaired. Woollen, linen, and

cotton

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cotton weavers are making greater exertions, and larger houfes are built for them. The magiftrates have long provided the community with excellent flour, barley, corn, and fulling mills. Dr. James Hay of Hayftown, befides improving his valuable eftate, and fetting an example of general improvement, has built a lint-mill for the accommodation of the country. Mr. William Ker of Kerfield, has erected one of the completest breweries and distilleries, and made a new and ufeful improvement in the art of brewing: Perceiving a part of the fine effluvia of the hop to fly off during the boiling of the worts, he contrived a moft ingenious and effectual method of preferving it. He covers his copper with a close, but moveable top of the fame metal, having a pipe defcending from it, and carried through cold water, like the worm of a ftill, by which means the fteam is condenfed and conducted into a common receiver, where the oil of the hop floating on the surface of the watery part, is fkimmed off, and returned into the worts when the boiling is finished. By this means a third of the hop is faved, and the most aromatic part of it is preserved, lo as to give the beer a finer flavour, and keeps it from fouring till it is brought to a greater age and excellence. He has formed a design of erecting a woollen manufacture according to the most approved plan, which will also be of general utility. By the great increase of trade and opulence, the price of labour of all kinds has increased one third part within these twenty years. Men fervants have 61. or 71., and maid fervants 31. Sterling of yearly wages, befides their victuals. Common labourers have I s. a-day, without victuals, and mafons and carpenters 1 s. 6d. All claffes are better educated, better lodged, better clothed and fed than in former times. It is also happy for those in the lower claffes, that though Peebles is the thoroughfare for oatmeal, carried from the richer corn country on the eaft, to the mining and manu

facturing

facturing country on the weft, yet the average price of this meal for twenty years paft, has not exceeded 9 d., or at most 10 d. the peck; and it is a received maxim, that while a labourer can earn a peck of oatmeal in a day, he will, in common cafes, be able to support his family.

Antiquities and Curiofities.-The Celta, a numerous and powerful people, who spread over a great part of the north and weft of Europe, and who, as Julius Cæfar informs us, were, in the neighbouring country, called alfo Galli, were the first inhabitants of Britain, and the Celtic or Gaelic was its first and universal language. About the beginning of the Christian æra, the Romans fubdued and provinciated what of the island lies fouth of the Forth and the Clyde, and introduced in many places the Latin. The Saxons in the 5th, and the Dapes in the 9th and 11th centuries, made invafions and fettlements in Britain, and introduced their language. By these means, and by the great numbers of the English, who, upon the Norman conqueft, came into the fouth of Scotland, and had lands given them, the Celtic language gradually gave way in this part of the country, to the Roman and the Saxon, of which our present English language is compofed. Of these things veftiges ftill remain in this parish and in the neighbourhood. At Lyne, four miles weft from Peebles, is a diftina Roman Caftra Stativa, 500 feet fquare, with two ditches and three ramparts, containing between fix and seven acres. Three miles fouth from this camp, and on the other fide of the Tweed, is a hill called Cademuir, anciently Cadhmore, fignifying in Gaelic," the great fight;" on the top of which are four British camps, one of them much stronger than the rest, furrounded with ftone walls, without cement, in fome places double, and where single, no less than five yards in thickness; without which, and out of the ruins of which, have been VOL. XII.

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erected

erected near 200 monumental ftones, many of them still standing, and others fallen down,-indications that in very early times, when the Gaelic was the common language of the country, and when the Romans had as yet been the only invaders of it, a great battle had been fought on that hill, and that at the strong camp on the top of it, numbers had been killed, and were buried. On the extremity of the parish toward the N. W., is a high hill called Melden, properly Meltein, "the Hill of Fire," from the fires kindled on the top of it, anciently in worship of the Sun, or afterward to give fignal to the furrounding country, when enemies appeared in the Frith of Forth; and round the top of it a large incloure or camp is vifible. Toward the east part of the parish is a hill called Frineti, or properly Daneti or Danes'-brae, with two circular camps, of which the highest has been surrounded with a ditch above ten feet in depth. Many other camps are to be seen on eminences and on the tops of hills, all over the country, veftiges of ancient invafion and danger. In later ages, when the ancient smaller kingdoms in the island were formed, into the two larger ones of Scotland and England, as the Cheviot hills were a natural barrier between them in the middle of the country, invasion and war were made by the mouth of the Tweed on the E. and of the Solway on the W.; yet small parties of the army often penetrated for plunder into the interior parts. The predatory difpofition, but too much exemplified by the nations, was practised all over the country, and particularly toward the borders, where troops of freebooters made incurfions into this part of the country every fummer, for carrying off, under night, horses, black cattle, and sheep. In defence against thefe various depredations, ftrong caftles were built, by the kings of Scotland, on the lower parts of the Tweed, and were continued by the landholders along the higher parts of it, and on the waters which

on