‘Oh, the well’s there yet right enough,’ said the shepherd in answer to my inquiry. ‘But it’s no’ just easy findin’ it. Yon signpost on the main road’s verra deceivin’. It’s doun in yon park. I’ll tak’ ye to’t.’
Down we went, leaving the moor for the damp green meadow at the bottom, below Tweedshaws, where the valley widened and lost its cup-like shape…
There was no sign of the well, when suddenly he stopped. All the dogs stopped, and I naturally stopped too.
‘Here it’s. This is Tweed’s Well’.
I don’t know what I had been expecting…This was quite small, and quite shallow. A rather ugly piece of board had been set in at one side to shore up the edge. It was not in the least the romantic significant water-hole I had looked to see.
I thought of Dr John Brown’s lovely description:
‘In summer when all things are faint with the fierce heat you may see it lying in the dim waste, a daylight star, in the blaze of the sun, keeping fresh its circle of young grass and flowers….In winter of all waters it alone lives, the keen ice that seals up and silences the brooks and shallows has no power here …’
‘Weel?’ said the shepherd, evidently disappointed by the lack of appreciative comment… ‘It’s queer, ay. But it’s weel kenned that the well’s the source o’ Tweed’, he said firmly.
From the Border Hills, Chapter 8 by Molly Clavering (1953)
