Alexander, by the grace of God king of the Scots, to all worthy men of his entire land [sends] greeting. Know us to have conceded, and by this our charter to have made firm, in pure and everlasting alms, to the abbot and convent of Melrose, that all lands between Gala and Leader which they have held or in possession of which they have been, and also all other lands which they have held or in possession of which they have been on the south side of the Tweed, which adjoin the lands of Lessudden and the lands of the monks of Kelso, and whatever is contained within the said lands which we have deforested for them, as much below ground as above, they may hold and have for ever in free forest, strictly forbidding anyone, without the express permission of the abbot and convent themselves, to cut wood, hunt, fish, or go fowling, or attempt to do any other thing against the will of same in the said lands, on pain of our full forefeiture of ten pounds. As witnesses: Geoffrey, elect of Dunkeld; Laurence of Abernethy; Bernard Fraser; Thomas son of Ranulf; William of Lindsay; David of Lindsay; Alexander of Stirling. At Ancrum, on the third day of December in the twenty-second year of the reign of the lord king.
