BATHAN'S-ST-ABBEY, a parish, in the county of Berwick, 7 miles (N. by W.) from Dunse; containing 146 inhabitants. The appellation of this place has been successively written St. Boythan's, Bothan's, and Bathan's, which last form it has preserved since the earlier part of the eighteenth century: the name was derived from the patron saint, Baithen, who laboured here in the former part of the seventh century, and to whom the first church was dedicated. The word Abbey, it is siipposed, was prefixed to distinguish the parish from the parish of Gifford or Yester, in East Lothian, which was also called St. Bothan's, but had no convent. Near the church, which was destroyed more than once by fire during the incursions of the Danes, a convent of Cistercian nuns was founded between the years 1184 and 1'200, with the title of priory, by Ada, daughter to King William the Lion, and wife to Patrick, Earl of Dunbar. This institution, by the liberal benefactions of the foundress and her husband, and various other persons, acquired considerable estates, in addition to the patronage of the church, by which the nuns were enabled, through the appointment of a vicar, to appropriate to themselves the revenues of the living. A chapel was also founded in the parish, about a quarter of a mile from the nunnery, on the same side of the river Whitadder; the foundations of which lately existed. At Strafontane, which is now part of the parish, but was anciently distinct, an hospital was founded in the reign of David I., which at one time was dependent on the abbey of Alnwick, but was transferred in 1437 by the abbot of that place to the monastery of Dryburgh. It came afterwards into the possession of the collegiate church of Dunglass, and was ultimately converted into a church. The mean length of the parish, from east to west, is about three miles and a quarter, and its breadth two miles and a half. It contains about .5000 acres, of which '2600 are hilly pasture never cultivated, 100 wood, and 2300 arable. The parish is situated among the Lammerinoor hills, and the surface consequently consists of hills and slopes, the former of which are for the most part covered with heath; the hills rise to various elevations, of between 300 and 400 feet above the intervening vales, and then spread out into extensive flats. The level grounds on the banks of the streams whi