TWEEDSMUIR PARISH HISTORY.
Enlightenment.
There are many stirring stories involving the Crook Inn including fugitive Covenanters, Jacobites, Poachers etc that have been brought to life in the works of the many notable literary stalwarts of the day that enjoyed the hospitality of the Inn. This was during the era known in Scottish History as the Enlightment. One feature of the enlightment was the improvement in culture and intellect. However, the enlightment covered many fields including improvements in engineering, communications roads/canals etc, mathematics, agriculture, art and architecture, economics, philosophy etc. However it was the culture that was based on close reading of new books and intense discussions taking place daily at intellectural gathering places particularly in Edinburgh but also elsewhere that arrived at the Crook Inn. The best known visitors to the Crook are Robert Burns and his friend the poet Robert Fergusson and also Sir Walter Scott. Others listed by Walter Buchan in his History of Peeblesshire(1) were - Lord Cockburn, Bishop Forbes, was there many a time, Veitch, Shairp, Christopher North, Dr. John Brown, Professor Blackie, Russel of the Scotsman , Andrew Lang all new it well. Sir Thomas Dick Lauder and William Black(11). The Bishop Forbes mentioned above would be Robert Forbes (1768-1775) an ardent Jacobite who wrote the epic Lyon in Mourning(1) see also page 14 McLarens Leap. He was not related to the Forbes family where a Lord Forbes had married Elizabeth Hunter of Polmood in 1792, see page Hunters of Polmood. An interesting fact about the enlightment is that it ended it could be said with the death of Sir Walter Scott in 1832.
Robert Burns purportedly wrote the words for his poem Willie's Wife while at the Crook. For more about this and the site of Linkumdodie see page Willie's Wife.
Sir Walter Scott wove the McLarens Leap incident mentioned above into his novel Redgauntlet.(2)(3).
Sir Walter Scott also wrote about Talla Linns in his novel Heart of Midlothian(5), and the conventicle that took place in 1682.(4) Sir Walter described Talla Linns as a wild and well sequestered dell - he had obviously visited the site. See page on the Covenanters.
References.
1) Buchan, J. W,/Paton, H, Rev. History of Peeblesshire, Jackson Wylie, Glasgow, 1927. Vol III. p365
2) Forbes, Robert, Rev, (edited by Rev H. Paton); Lyon in Mourning, Scottish History Society, Edinburgh, 1895. Series 1, Vol 3, pp230-231.
3) Scott, Walter, Sir; Redgauntlet - Waverley Novels, Centenary Edition, Vol XVIII, Adam & Charles Black, Edinburgh, 1887. pp269-270 and Footnote p270.
4) Ireland, Ronald; The Bloody Covenant Kirk and Crown in Conflict, History Press, Stroud, 2010. p177-178 and p180 - Footnote.
5) Scott, Walter, Sir; Heart of Midlothian, Waverley Novels,Vol XII, Cadell and Co Edinburgh, 1830. p85 and p91 end-note III.