messengers' return, there should few of them return to their own home. They made no stay, but they were turned homewards before the messenger had made an end of his message. Thus, by God's mercy and by my means, there were a great many lives spared that day."[66] Thus ended happily what might otherwise have proved a disastrous encounter. Such incidents tend to prove that the Borderers might have been governed with comparative ease had they only been dealt with in a firm but kindly spirit. The rough usage to which they were frequently subjected at the hands of the government made them reckless, and not unnaturally led them to regard the law not as a friend, but as an enemy. IX. LIDDESDALE LIMMERS. "_Wicked thieves and limmers._" ACT OF PARLIAMENT. "Thir limmer thieves, they have good hearts, They nevir think to be o'erthrown; Three banners against Weardale men they bare, As if the world had been their own." ROOKHOPE RYDE. Though reiving may be said to have been a characteristic of the inhabitants along the whole Border line from Berwick to the Solway, yet it was only in the district known as Liddesdale where it attained, what we might designate, its complete development as a thoroughly organized system. This part of Roxburghshire is, to a certain extent, detached from the rest of the county by reason of the fact that it lies south of the range of hills which form the watershed between the Solway and the German Ocean. This picturesque and interesting district, so famous in Border song and story, is of a somewhat triangular shape, and at present forms one of the largest parishes in the south of Scotland, measuring some twenty miles by fourteen. It is bounded by England on the south, by Dumfriesshire on the west, and by the parishes of Teviothead, Hobkirk, and Southdean on the north. The upper, or northern, portion is mountainous and bleak. Some of the hills along its boundaries are high and precipitous, the lofty peaks of Millenwood Fell and Windhead attaining an elevation of close on 2000 feet. Tudhope hill, which forms a landmark for ships at sea, is 1830 feet high. The lower end of the district is less mountainous, but the whole country is wild and bare, except in the valleys, which are clothed in the richest green, and are sunny and sheltered.