The Abbey of Kelso, like those at Melrose and Jedburgh, and several more in other parts of Scotland, owes its foundation to David I., the pious son of a pious mother--"St." David, as he is often called. Standing at his tomb at Dunfermline, the first of the Jameses, whose taste ran to poetry rather than to piety, and to pursuits yet more frivolous, is said to have uttered the much-quoted remark that his predecessor was "ane sair sanct for the Crown," thinking the while of the revenues which had been alienated to religious uses. The reflection is generally taken seriously, but the wisest of the Stuarts must have meant it at least as much in jest as in earnest. David was, in truth, anything but an ignorant, impulsive fanatic. His training at the refined court of Henry I. had rubbed off "the rust of Scottish barbarity," as an outspoken English annalist puts it; and coming to his kingship an educated and accomplished man, he set about reducing his rude realm to order and civilisation; and in fulfilment of this mission castles were built, burghs erected, and religious establishments founded. Those were the palmy days of monasticism, when religious houses had not come to be filled with ecclesiastics of the type of Friar John of Tillmouth, and the Abbot of Kennaquhair in the "Monastery;" and if it can be said of St. David that "he succeeded in reducing a wild part of Scotland to order," it is chiefly because he gave so powerful a stimulus to the agencies of the Church. [Illustration: KELSO, WITH RENNIE'S BRIDGE.]