A Sou’ Wester + rain all day. Faired about 6 + another heavy shower at 8. Bad day for Hawick Common Riding.1 Saw a few cases walking + saw Dav.2 dress some cases at the Home3 + went to Mrs Dunn, Marion Crescent4 with him. Wrote Norman Grieve5 + sent him Guthrie’s verses about the Putting Green + “No.9”.6 Felt better today + enjoyed my meals.7 Took some cold tongue + lager for lunch instead of tea.
1 The Hawick Common Riding was held in poor weather conditions in 1923, in complete contrast to the Common Riding as it is taking place this weekend, a century later.
2 David Charteris ‘Dav.’ Graham (1889-1963), M.B., Ch.B., medical practitioner and Dr Muir’s business partner.
3 The Home is Viewfield, the Muir and Graham medical partnership’s nursing home.
4 Assume this refers to Agnes Ralph Dunn née Waldie (1858-1926), of 1 Marion Crescent, Selkirk.
5 See also diary entry for 7 June 1923. Norman William Grieve who appears to have moved to (or taken an interest in property in) the Selkirkshire and Roxburghshire areas around 1911. It is feasible that he is the Norman William Grieve (about 1852-1936), born Hawick, who worked in tropical agriculture and as the director of public companies (rubber and tea companies according to A Hawick Word Book), he left £308,574.
6 It is not yet clear what the poems might be or if this refers to Jean Frances Guthrie Smith, later Neal (1895-1949), a relative of Dr Muir and a poet. She was published alongside authors such as D H Lawrence, John Middleton Murry, Henri Gaudier Brzeska and Isaac Rosenberg and in 1922 published ‘Adventure Square’, London: Hodder and Stoughton.
7 Dr Muir had been suffering from Dyspepsia again.
[Source: Scottish Borders Archives & Local History Service SBA/657/26, Dr J S Muir of Selkirk, medical practitioner, journal for 1923]
Rumbling Clint's Scottish Notes 