The
general congregation was numerically small, and we were surprised that
there was no collection! Service over, we returned to our lodgings for
tea, intending to resume our walk immediately afterwards. We were so
comfortable, however, and the experiences of the previous day and night
so fresh in our minds, and bodies, that we decided to rest our still
weary limbs here for the night, even though we had that day only walked
six miles, the shortest walk in all our journey.
[Illustration: KIRKANDREWS CHURCH.]
Our host, Mr. Forster, was moreover a very entertaining and remarkable
man. He had been parish clerk for many years, a Freemason for upwards of
thirty years, letter-carrier or postman for fourteen years, and recently
he and his wife had joined the Good Templars! He had many interesting
stories of the runaway marriages at Gretna Green, a piece of Borderland
neither in Scotland nor England, and he claimed to have suggested the
Act of Parliament brought in by Lord Brougham to abolish these so-called
"Scotch" marriages by a clause which required twenty-one days' residence
before the marriage could be solemnised, so that although the Act was
called Lord Brougham's Act, he said it was really his.
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