often ending in
death. We have wept over her grave; and who that has seen the old stone
in Henderland churchyard--now broken in three pieces, but bearing still
that epitaph which Longinus would have pronounced sublime, "Here lies
Parys of Cockburn, and his wife Marjory"--and looked on the old ruins of
their castle, now scarcely sufficient for a resting place for the grey
owl--could resist the rising emotion, or quell the heaving breast of
pity? There lie Parys of Cockburn, and his wife Marjory! How little does
that simple chronicle tell! and yet how much. The eloquence of that
pregnant negative of ultra-simplicity, is felt by those who know their
fate; but how many have trod on the three parts of the broken tombstone,
deciphered the divided syllables, and walked on, and never inquired who
was Parys of Cockburn, or Marjory his wife! Their bones have long
mouldered into the dust that now feeds a few wild alpine plants; their
tombstone is a broken ruin, and will soon pass away; their castle, at a
few paces' distance, is also a ruin of a few black weathered stones; and
the land they were proud to call their own, dignifies another name. The
sculptor has failed, but the poet has succeeded; and time may flap his
dark pinion in vain over the deserted churchyard of Henderland.

The Cockburns of Henderland were an old family of Selkirkshire. Long before
the estate passed into the hands of strangers, we find the name and
title holding a respectable place among the lists of chieftains that
held a divided rule on the Borders. Those who have gratified themselves,
as we have done, by a view of St. Mary's Loch, and the classic streams
of the Ettrick and Yarrow, cannot fail to have seen the old property of
Henderland, situated on the Megget, a small stream that runs into the
loch. That was once the seat of the Cockburns; but there is a sad change
there now. In the time of Lesly the historian, the whole of the country
round Henderland, and the property itself, were covered with wood, that
afforded shelter to the largest stags in Scotland; and now, there is
scarcely a single tree that rears its head for miles around. Not distant
from the mansion-house of the present proprietor, the ruins of the old
castellated residence of the Cockburns may be seen; and, in the deserted
burying-ground that surrounded the chapel, there is the broken
tombstone, recording the deaths of the last members of the family, in
the simple terms we have already mentio