supposed to be the Colonia of Ptolemy, and called by Bede the city Coldana and of Colud (Coludum), situated on the borders of Scotland, about two miles from Eyemouth, was a place famous many ages ago for its convent. This was the oldest nunnery in Scotland, for here the virgin-wife Etheldreda took the veil in 670; but by the ancient name Coludum it should seem that it had before been inhabited by the religious called Culdee. In 870 it was destroyed by the Danes, but its name rendered immortal by the heroism of its nuns; who, to preserve themselves inviolate from those invaders, cut off their lips and noses; and thus rendering themselves objects of horror, were, with their abess Ebba, burnt in the monastery by the disappointed savages. After this it lay deserted till the year 1098, when King Edgar founded on its site a priory of Benedictines in honour of St Cuthbert, and bestowed it on the monks of Durham.

Mr Pennant's description of the bleak, joyless, heathy moor where it was situated, might be sufficient to guard the fair inhabitants of the nunnery were it still subsisting. That description, however, is now altogether inapplicable: The whole tract, five miles over, has been since improved, and converted into corn fields; the cheerless village of Old Cambus is no more; a decent inn with good accommodations has been established at a convenient distance; and the passage of the steep glen called the Pease, which terminates the moor on the road towards Edinburgh, and was formerly the terror of travellers, is now rendered safe and easy by means of a bridge extending from one side of the chasm to the other.