MELROSE Parish Church
The Order of Service the week after Easter had a drawing of Pooh leading Piglet for a walk and saying ‘I always get to where I’m going by walking away from where I’ve been’.
It chimed with the story from Luke of the two disciples walking away from Jerusalem and the death of all their hopes and being caught up by an interesting stranger whom they did not recognise till he broke bread at the meal they were going to have at the inn and it was borne in upon them that their continuation of His life was to be the support of people who were walking away from their Jerusalem, whatever it might be.
The ‘they had hoped ‘ for something in their eyes bigger and better had changed for them and their fellow disciples into a different and more basic vocation.
News: St John’s visit, April 9; Kirk Session Thursday, April 18, 7pm; Open Door Thursday mornings in Hall; Bowden Cafe, April 17, morning; Next Messy Church, Sunday, May 12, beginning of Christian Aid Week; Special Organ
Completion Recital,Sunday, April 28, 3pm, John Kitchen; Gala foodbank usual pickup points and www.justgiving.com/galashielsfoodbank. Thankyou; Next Old Melrose Walk, Tuesday, May 7, 1.30pm at tearoom £4 adults,children free, dogs on lead
Trimontium
James Curle needed images for his Rhind Lectures in 1908 and whose help should he seek but that of Reginald Smith his literary correspondent in the British Museum in London.
“Dear Smith, If I am not giving you too much trouble, will you allow Oldland [a BM assistant who often appears in the letters] to photograph for me a typical blue glass bottle with a reeded handle, the square type, I think, and a little pillar-moulded glass bowl. You will know the things I mean.
“The glass at Newstead is so fragmentary that I can’t make a slide of anything, though these particular vessels can be easily recognized. I only want him to make a slide of them.
“I have found very little since I saw you, as most of the time we have been filling in.
“We began digging out again a few days ago and a few small things have turned up – a boss with a head of the god Mithras [ it proved not to be that]; a ring with enamelled spots; a late Celtic terret [piece of horse harness]; and the bottom part of a sword sheath – so there is still something to be found.
“By the way, we have identified an antler found some time ago as Elk.
“This is the first time, I fancy, that we have definitely got him with Roman remains. [Unfortunately for Curle and the advice of experts at that time, the antler was studied recently by the Vertebrates Curator at the National Museum and identified as being red deer. The saying ‘You can’t win them all’, comes to mind.]
“I am sorry to say I have not been able to send you the photograph of our S-shaped brooch.
“I found the one I had done was too small, but I have a drawing which I shall send next week.
“In the meantime will you be so kind as to ask Oldland to make a slide of the Samian (red-coloured) bowl with the wide flat rim with lotus bud decoration.
“You remember we discussed the period. It is on the ground level in the case on the right side to your room in the BM.
“I begin my lectures on Monday but the pottery is not till the following week, so if he will let me have it by 4th April it will do.
“Please excuse this bother. [There were six Lectures – March 30 and April 1, 3, 6, 8 and 10 – covering chapters 1 to 16 of the 1911 book; a feat of organization.]
“Believe me, Yours sincerely, James Curle”.