Scott, for once, was wrong in his localities. The Dodhead of the poem is
_not_ that near Singlee, in Ettrick, but a place of the same name, near
Skelfhill, on the southern side of Teviot, within three miles of Stobs,
where Telfer vainly seeks help from Elliot. The other Dodhead is at a
great distance from Stobs, up Borthwick Water, over the tableland, past
Clearburn Loch and Buccleugh, and so down Ettrick, past Tushielaw. The
Catslockhill is not that on Yarrow, near Ladhope, but another near
Branxholme, whence it is no far cry to Branxholme Hall. Borthwick Water,
Goudilands (below Branxholme), Commonside (a little farther up Teviot),
Allanhaugh, and the other places of the Scotts, were all easily “warned.”
There are traces of a modern hand in this excellent ballad. The
topography is here corrected from MS. notes in a first edition of the
_Minstrelsy_, in the library of Mr. Charles Grieve at Branxholme’ Park, a
scion of “auld Jock Grieve” of the Coultart Cleugh. Names linger long in
pleasant Teviotdale.