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GKETNA OTEEN 


Zendcn. Jtuhard. Ben£Uy, 1844. 


CHRONICLES 


OF 


GRETNA GREEN. 


By PETER ORLANDO HUTCHINSON. 


" Marry in haste, and repent at leisure."— Old Proverb. 


IN TWO VOLUMES. 
VOL. I. 


LONDON: 
RICHARD BENTLEY, NEW BURLINGTON STREET. 

1844. 


.1 


PREFACE. 

The following Work must not be mistaken for 
a fiction: it is not a fiction, it is a history. If 
we have not everywhere preserved the sedate and 
plodding doggedness of the grave historian, this 
will nothing invalidate our veracity ; for we believe 
we may confidently say, that we have not brought 
forward any fact, professedly as such, without 
having had good authority for so doing. 

Our materials and our anecdotes were collected 
in the parish of Gretna Green itself, and that, too, 
from such sources as may be held worthy of credit. 
That portion of the Work most pleasurable to the 
general taste, will, perhaps, be the Second Vo- 
lume, or the portion which comes down nearer to 
the present day; but if there are any persons 
living who have visited the Hymeneal shrine of 
Gretna, (which no doubt there are,) we hope 
they will not feel offended at anything these pages 
contain. Our purpose has not been to annoy any 
one, but only to write a history. 


IV 


PREFACE. 


A word for the Illustrations. The survey for 
the Map was made before our own eyes; and 
though not trigonometrically done, we believe it 
to be tolerably accurate. The views are engraved 
from sketches made by us on the spot, and their 
fidelity may be relied on. 


London, December 1843. 


CONTENTS 


OF 


THE FIRST VOLUME. 


CHAPTER I. 

PACK 

Situation of Gretna. — The Debateable Land. — Walls 
of Agricola and Adrian. — Wall of Severus. — Arthur's 
Court. — Arthur's Queen insulted. — Peredur and the 
Knight. — Peredur's knight-errantry. — His Prowess. — 
Gwalchmai's Offer. — Peredur and Gwalchmai. — Pere- • 
dur's Courtship. . . .1 

CHAPTER II. 

The Picts. — First Gretna Nuptials. — Origin of Chau- 
cer's "Wife's Tale." — Arthur and the Grim Baron. — 
The Grim Lady. — The Secret revealed. — Gawaine's Mag- 
nanimity. — Fetching the Bride. — The Reward of Friend- 
ship.— The Bride's Tale.— The First Marriage at Gretna. 17 

CHAPTER III. 

Legend of King Arthur and Sir Owain 28 

CHAPTER IV. 

Ancient Kings of Scotland. — Wars between the Bri- 
tons, Danes, and Saxons. . .42 

CHAPTER V. 

Downfall of the Saxons, and establishment of the Norman 
ascendancy. — Battle between the English and Scoto- 
Saxons. . . .61 

VOL. I. /; 


VI CONTENTS. 


CHAPTER VI. 


FAGK 


State of Scotland at the death of Alexander III.— Voy- 
age of Sir Patric Spens.— Competitors for the Crown of 
Scotland.— Siege of Carlisle.— Heroism of the Women in 
the Castle. . . . . 77 

CHAPTER VII. 

Battles between the English and the Scotch in the reign 
of Edward the First . . . . .95 

CHAPTER Vin. 

Military Annals : Brace and Baliol.— Border Laws. . 106 

CHAPTER IX. 
Border Feuds : Percy and Douglas . 119 

CHAPTER X. 
Border Feuds . . .133 

CHAPTER XL 

Treaty of Peace between James IV. of Scotland and 
Henry VII. of England. — Minority of James V. — His 
Adventures in disguise. — The Gaberlunzie Man. . 143 

CHAPTER XII. 

The Widow of Annandale, Sir John Charters, and the 
King ....... 165 

CHAPTER XIII. 
History of John Armstrong, the famous Border Outlaw 161 

CHAPTER XIV. 

Dick o* the Cow, and the Laird's Jock .184 


CONTENTS. VII 

CHAPTER XV. 

PAGB 

Feat of the Blind Harper of Lochmaben . 200 

CHAPTER XVI. 
The Raid of Solway Moss . . .212 

CHAPTER XVII. 
Sketch of the History of Mary Queen of Scots . 221 

CHAPTER XVIII. 
Lores of Mary and Both well .... 233 

CHAPTER XIX. 

The Lord Scroop, and the Bold Buccleuch. — The False 
Sakelde. — Willie o'Kinmont captured and rescued. . 249 

CHAPTER XX. 

The " Pretender M . . ,275 

CHAPTER XXI. 

Attempt of the Young Pretender. — His advance to 
Derby. — Retreat to Scotland. — Battle of Culloden. — Pre- 
sent appearance of the Field of Battle . . . 283 

CHAPTER XXII. 
A Tragical Love Story of the " Olden Time." . 299 


■ 


CHRONICLES 


OF 


GRETNA GREEN. 


CHAPTER I. 

Situation of Gretna. — The Debateable Land. — Walls of Agri- 
cola and Adrian.— -Wall of Severus.— Arthur's Court. — 
Arthur's Queen insulted. — Peredur and the Knight. — Pere- 
dur's knight-errantry. — His Prowess.-^-Owalchmai's Offer. 
—Peredur and Gwalchmai. — Peredur's Courtship. 


Here Chapter First begins the work, 

With matters worth your heeding, 
With legends, old traditions, tales, 

^s ye may see by reading, 

A dread cometh oyer us as we take our grey 
goose-quill in hand, and set our joints to the writing 
of this most notable history. There is something 
magical about the words " Gretna Green;" and 
we never hear them but we instantly " prick up 
our ears," as some tender poet saith, and are 
straightway filled with curiosity, interest, yearning, 
and desire. Wherefore, borne up and borne 
along by this conviction, and especially for the 

vol. i. a 


2 THE DEBATEABLE LAND. 

explication of certain erroneous ideas which the 
distant world has assumed touching traditions of 
this place, do we subihit the pages ^here following 
to the consideration of the reader. 

The parish of Gretna, or Graitney, as it is 
sometimes written, lies in the county of Dumfries, 
and is situate, as most run-aways well know, 
close on the borders of* Scotland and England: 
and that border is here defined by the small river, 

* Sark. The western '83a, 'or, 'under correction, the 
Sol way Firth, lies here so contiguous that the tide 
flows up to the very bridge that runs over the said 
river, titer whiih bridge "nitis the Queen's ! high- 
way, Hwixt Carlisle and Annan, "and over which 
highway run lovers not a few. 

About two miles on the English side of the 
Sark, we have the river Esk, in some soft parallel 
thereunto, and also falling into the Sol way Firth : 
it is traversed by a fair stone and iron fridge, and 
is a larger stream than the former by fourfold. 

Betwixf these two, Kes the u Debate^ble Land," 
a region csspfecially' hOttfd In the pages' Of historiogra- 

» phers, and the stiehe of niady a bloody sttife when 
the borderers could not agree. ^Thts Debateable 
Land was, howler, scarcely worth debating about, 
seeing that it is a bog, a 'march, a quagmire, a 
swamp, across which a man cannot pass at hazard, 
lest lie sink, ' being bade up of peat, which the 
inhabitants in the vicinage procure for fuel. Now, 


WALLS OF AGRTCOLA AND ADRIAN. S 

a peat bog in this country, they call a " moss,'' or 
a "peat-moss," and this identical one goes by 
the name of "Sol way Moss." There are many 
such, not only here about, but in diyers parts of 
Scotland, Wales, and Ireland. 

* The gfeat field of our discussions and specula- 
tions, which will 'fill the pages of this history, lying 
sound the Firth of Sol way, was, in the earliest 
ages, as authors say, occupied by a tribe of Britons 
known as the Selgova; and jt was these whom 
Agricola with his Romans disconcerted, when Jie 
came this way with hostile intent. It was in the 
third year of his progress that he arrived here, 
and soon after he built the wall stretching from 
the land of the Dalriads to the eastern sea near 
the Maiden's Castle, vulgarly called Edinburgh. 
In the year 120, the emperor .Adrian crossed over 
from Gaul, in order that he might gall the Cale- 
donians with a fresh yoke; but he proceeded no 
further than York, for .some old soldiers, who 
had* before- penetrated into the country with former 
commanders, told him that the (painted savages 
fought well and hit hard; and- moreover, the re- 
gion that they fought and hit for, was not worth 
quarrelling about, being wild, mountainous, and 
barren. Wherefore, Adrian the emperor, resolved 
that he would* not go further from home, but erect- 
ed that vast Thust-far-ehalt-thou-come-and-no-fur- 

ther, running from the western waters near Gretna 

b 2 


Adrian's wall. 


across the country to the river Tyne: a work 
which was designed to debar the wanderings of the 
Pictish Northerners, but which ill effected this end, 
* since it stretched to the length of sixty English, or 
seventy Roman miles, and no more than eighteen 
hundred men were allotted for its defence on the 
southern side. It traversed these parts between 
merry Carlisle and Gretna Green of honourable men- 
tion, well-nigh skirting the Debateable Land : but 
6wing to the loamy nature of the soil here, the in- 
dustrious mattock of Time hath dug down the ram- 
part and shovelled it into the ditch, even where 
it was before the Romans dug it but, so that now 
it is pretty well destroyed. 

It should appear that this fortification consisted 
of a series of vallations, and that, in fact, they 
were as follows :— first, on the southern, or Eng- 
lish side, a rampart ten or twelve feet high ; theii 
five paces towards Scotland, another rampart, or 
agger of equal size ; outside that a ditch, being 
about nine feet deep, eleven feet wide at the -top, 
and somewhat less at the bottom ; and lastly, at 
about* seven or eight paces further north from 
the ditch, a broad 'rampart, but considerably 
lower than the others. This fortification is said, 
to have been made of earth only faced with turf; 
and Capitolinus, in his biography of Antoninus Pius, 
says that the wall erected in 81, by Agricola, and 
strengthened afterwards by this emperor in 140, 


WALL OF SEVERUS. 5 

Stretching from the Firth of Clyde to the Firth of 
Forth, was built in the same way also ; bat Cam- 
den contradicts this, in so far that he declares it to 
have been faced with square blocks of hewnstone ; 
and this last assertion has been fully corroborated by 
the quantities of fragments and sculptured vestiges 
that have from time to time been discovered on this 
line. It is concluded to have been composed of soft 
materials like the other, but faced with masses 
of stone, in order to prevent the earth from fall- 
ing, into the ditch. There are certain scattered 
passages in Ossian, the son of Fingal, which go 
to support Mr. Camden,— as, for instance, in the 
poem ycleped " The War of .Caros," where ye may 
thus read : — 

" What does Caros, king of ships F* said the 
son, Oscar, of the now mournful Ossian ; " spreads 
he the wings of his pride, [the Roman eagle,] bard 
of the times of old ?" 

"He spreads them, Oscar," replied the bard, 
" but it is behind his gathered heap. He looks 
over his stones with fear.'" 

The 4< gathered heap" is here understood to be 
the wall of Agricola, near which the. battle was 
fought, and the word " stones," clearly indicates 
the nature of the material with which it was con- 
structed — at all events, externally. Caros is de- 
cided to have been no other than the usurper 
Carausius, • who assumed the purple in 284, and 


6 ARTHUR'S COURT. 

ixt this action the Caledonians were commanded 
by Oscar, the son of Ossiao. 

The wall of Severn*, drawn across the island 
W. the Sclway, Bear where the n^er* Gretn. 
Green lies, audi following, nearly the line of 
Adrian's, made some years before, was, according 
to Aurelius Victor, Oosius, Spartian, and others, 
a work of greater labour, vastness, and strength 
than any of the others that had been thrown np 
by the Romans. It was built of free-stone 
throughout, both internally and externally;, it 
was well grouted with lime, so that it soon con- 
solidated into a hard mass* and it was guarded 
by ten thousand troops, who kept watch in turrets 
and castles scattered along its whole extent at 
intervals. For two hundred years it kept the 
Picts in eheck, and would longer have continued 
to do so, had not the garrison -been withdrawn, 
and ordered back to Italy. 

Now, Gretna Green in aftertimes formed part 
of the territory of the renowned Prince Arthur, 
Basileus and Bretwalda of Britain, and merry 
Carlisle was one of his capital cities, wherein he 
held his principal court. " Arthur held his court 
in merry • Carlisle, 1 ' saith Sir Francis PaJgrave ; 
" and Peredur, the Prince of Sunshine, 'whose 
name we find amongst the princes of Strath-Clyde, 
is one of the great heroes of The Mabinogion, -or 
tales of youth, long preserved by tradition amongst 
the Cymry." 


Arthur's queen insulted. 7 

We. will not bere enter upc* any erudite di* 
cuasion qji the geographical knowledge of the 
ancients, or thye extent of accuracy with which 
they constructed maps, or described localities; .nor 
will we. (to descend fipm generalities to particu- 
larities), speculate qji. tjbe probability that Carlisle, 
the former Ca#i;-luei, not far frpm the river E$k, 
may ojr may. ip>t ha,v$ have been the Caerlleon 
upon, Vsk x pf the 0I4 ron^nce^ A^thui; wafc at 
Caerlleon upon U$l$, s^ys, the legend of, l^eredur- 
ab-Efraw^ in the, Mabi^pgiou.alpove. alluded to; 
and it proceeds to qet farth l^aw he sat in his 
hall, surrounded by si;alw^t knights;. au,d how 
Gwenhwyvaij his queen, who was beautiful to, a 
proverb, sat there alsp, along with a bevy of fair 
maidens, who discoursed sweetly, pr woye tapestry 
and other cunning needlework. "Meanwhile* 
Peredur journeyed on> towards Arthur's court," 
are the words of Lady Guest's translation ; " and 
before he reached it, another knight had beep 
there, who, gave a ring of thick gold at the <Joor 
of the gate for holding his horse, and went into 
the hall, where Arthu^ and his household and 
Gwenhwyvar apQ. her maidejpp were .assembled. 
And the pagp of tl^e phfUttber. was serving Gwen- 
hwyvar with a golden goblet. Then the knight 
dashed the liquor that was therein upon her face, 
and uppn her stomacher, and gavp her a violent 
blow on the face, and said, 'If any have the 


/ 


8 RECEPTION OF PEREDUR. 

boldness to dispute this goblet with me, and to 
revenge the insult to Gwenhwyvar, let him follow 
me to the meadow, and there I will await him. 1 
So -the knight took his horse and rode to the 
meadow : and all the household hung down their 
heads, lest any of them should # be requested to 
go and avenge the insult to Gwenhwyvar. For 
it seemed to them that no one would have ven- 
tured on so daring an outrage, unless he possessed 
such powers, through majjic or charms, that none 
could be able to take vengeance upon him. Then, 
behold, Peredur entered the hall." 

Here he inquires for Arthur amongst the com- 
pany; but Sir Kai, who had a very unamiable 
and discourteous disposition, answers in a most 
untoward manner, and desires to know what he 
wapts . of Arthur ? After a while, Peredur re- 
peats his question: "'Tall man, 1 said he, c show 
me which is Arthur. 1 ' Hold thy peace, 1 said 
Kai, ' and go after the knight who went hence 
to the meadow, and take from him the goblet, 
and overthrow him, and possess thyself of his 
horse and arms, and then shalt thou receive the 
order of knighthood. 1 ' I will do so, tall man, 1 
said Peredur. So he turned his horse's head to- 
wards the meadow ; and when he came there, the 
knight was riding up and down, proud* of his 
strength, and valour, and noble mien. c Tell me, 1 
said the knight, ' didst thou see any one coming 


PEREDUR AND THE KNIGHT. 9 

after me from the court?' 'The tall man that- 
was there,' said he, ' desired me to come and over- 
throw thee, and take from thee the goblet, and thy 
horse, and thy armour for myself.' ' Silence ! * 
said the knight ; ' go back to the court, and tell 
Arthur from me, either to come himself, or to send 
some other to fight with me ; and unless he do so 
quickly, I will not wait for him.' * By my faith,' 
said Peredur, ' choose thou whether it shall be 
willingly or unwillingly, but I will have the horse, . 
and the arms, and the goblet.' And upon this 
the knight ran at him furiously, and struck him a 
.violent blow with the shaft of his spear, between 
the neck and the shoulder. ''Haha, lad!' said 
Peredur, 'my mother's servants were not used 
to play with me in this wise ; therefore, thus will 
I play with thee.' And hereupon he struck him 
with a sharp-pointed fork, and it hit him in the 
eye, and came out at the back of his neck, so that 
he instantly fell down lifeless. 

" ' Verily,' said Owain, the son of Urien, to 
Kai, 'thou wert ill advised when thou didst -send 
that madman [meaning Peredur] after the knight ; 
for one of two things must befall him,— he must 
either be overthrown or slain. If he is overthrown 
by the knight, he will be counted by him to be aa 
honourable person of the court, and an eternal dis- 
grace will it be to Arthur and his warriors : and if. 
he is slain, the disgrace will be the same, and more- 

B 5 


10 peredur's knight-errantry. 

over his sin will be upon "him ; therefore, will I go 
and see what has befallen him,** So Owain went 
to the meadow, and he found Peredur dragging 
the man about. 'What art thou doing thus?' 
Said Owain. ' This iron coat/ saSl Peredur, * will 
never come from off him, not by my efforts, at any 
rate.' And Owain unfastened his armour and bis 
clothes. 'Here, my good soul,' said he, 6 is a 
horse and armour better than thine. Take them 
joyfully, and come with me to Arthur lo receive 
the order of knighthood, for thou dost, merit 
it.'" • 

Now, gentle reader, if it be jthat this Caerlleon, 
where Arthur then held his court, be Carlisle city 
nigh unto Gretna, Peredur compassed this achieve- 
ment in the meadow that stretches along beneath 
the castle walls, as ye may behold at this day; 
and the Mabinogion will, further tell ye how this 
rare warrior traversed these regions, doing service 
to distressed maidens, and swearing oathe; ten 
fathom de$p to his lady love ; for, even twelve 
or thirteen centuries ago, there seems to have been 
something loving and lovable pervading the atmo- 
sphere of the Sol way. .*' And in the evening lie 
entered a valley," we are informed; "and at the 
head of the valley he came to a hermit's cell, and 
the hermit welcomed him gladly, and there he 
spent the night. And in the morning, he arose, 
and when he went forth, behold a shower of snow 


HIS PROVES?. 1 1 

had fallen/the night before, an (J a hawk had Jailed a 
wild fowl in front of the eel} ; and tbp npjse of the 
-horse scqrefl tbp hawjc frway, and a rayen alighted 
upon the bifd. And Perpduf stood ^d ppqapared 
the blackqj^s of the favep, aijd J;he whiteness of 
the snow, anji fy$ recess of the blood, tp the 
hair of the lady that b$st he loved, which w$s 
blackejr than jet,'and tp Jbuejc skin, which was whiter 
than ttye ^Q^y, and to ib,e two r;ed spots upon her 
cheeks, which vr$x% redder than the blood upoji 
the Sjopw appeared to t?p. 

" ^jTofp ^x^Jrar and jbis Court ,wpre iff search of 
peredi^*. 4 Kp,oTf ye/ sptj Ajthjjr, * wfro is i% 
knight witji the long spear that stands by the 
brook up yppdiejr?' .'Jjord/ sfiid one of them, 
'I wfll go ^p4 lean^ who he is/ So the youjtb 
came tp the plaice where Peredur was, and asked 
him what he did thus, and who he was. And 
from the intensity with \yhich he thought upon 
the lady whom best he lov$d, he gavie him no 
answer. . Thqn the youth thrust at Peredur with 
his Jance, 9^nd Peredur turned upon him, and 
struck hinji pv$f his horpe',3 crupper to tjie ground. 
And after this, fouf ja^ad twenty youths came to 
him, and he $id ,not answer one more than 
another, hut gaye the same reception to all, 
bringing them with one single thtyst to the 
ground. And then came K$i, and spoke to 
Peredur rudely and angrily; and Peredur took 


12 GWALCHMAI'S OFFER. 

him with his lance under the jaw, and cast him 
from him with a thrust, so that he broke his 
arm and his shoulder blade, and he rode over 
him one and twenty times. And while he lay 
thus, stunned with the violence of the pain that 
he had suffered, his horse returned back at a 
wild and prancing pace. And when the house- 
hold saw the horse come back without his rider, 
they rode forth in haste to the place where the 
encounter had been. And when they first came 
there, they thought that Kai was slain ; but they 
found that if he had a skilful physician, he yet 
might lire. And Peredur moved not from his 
meditation, on. seeing the concourse that was 
around Kai. And Kai was brought to Arthur's 
tent, and Arthur caused skilful physicians to com& 
to him. And Arthur was grieved that Kai had 
met with this reverse, for he loved him greatly. 

" * Then,' said Gwalchmai, c it is not fitting that 
any should disturb an honourable knight from his 
thought unadvisedly; for either he is pondering 
some damage that he has sustained, or he is 
thinking on the lady whom best he loves. And 
through such ill-advised proceeding, perchance this 
misadventure has befallen hini who last met with 
him. And if it seem well to thee, lord, I will 
go and see' if this knight has changed froih his 
thought ; and if he has, I will ask him courteously 
to come and visit thee. 9 


PEREDUR AND GWALCHMAI. 13 

" Then Kqi was Wrath, and he spoke angry and 
spiteful words. c Gwalchmai,' said he; ( 1 know 
that thou wilt bring him, because he is fatigued. 
Little praise and honour, nevertheless, wilt, thou 
have from vanquishing a weary knight, who is 
tired with fighting. Yet, thus hast thou gained 
the advantage over many. And while thy speech 
and thy soft words last, a coat of thin linen were 
armour enough for thee ; and thou wilt not need 
to break either lance or sword in fighting with 
the knight in the state he is in.' 

" Then said Gwalchmai to Kai, ( Thou mightiest 
use more pleasant words, wert thou so minded ; 
and it behoves thee not upon me to wreak thy 
wrath and thy displeasure. Methinks I shall 
bring the knight hither without breaking either 
iny arm or my shoulder.' 

"Then said Arthur to Gwalchmai, c Thou speak- 
est like a wise and prudent man ; go, and take 
enough of armour about thee, and choose thy 
tiorse.' And Gwalchmai accoutred himself, and 
rode forward hastily to the place where Peredur 
w&s. 

u And Peredur was resting on the shaft of his 
spear, pondering the same thought, and Gwalch- 
mai came to him without any signs of hostility, 
and said to him, 'If I thought that it would 
be as agreeable to thee as it would be to me, 
I would converse with thee. . I have also a mes- 


14 peredur's courtship. 

• • 

sage from Arthur unto thee, to pray thee tQ come 
pnd visit him. And two men have bepq. before 
on this errand/ 

?< ' That is true/ said Peredur ; * 9n<J uncouj- 
teously they came. They f^ktac^ed me 5 .and I 
was annoyed thereat, fp? it w$ts not pleasing tp 
n^e to be dp-awn from the thought I was ip, fpr 
| W£S thinking on: the lady whom b/est I love/ 

" Said Gwalchmai, c This wagf not §n ungentle 
thought, and I should marvel if ft ipe/:e pleasant 
to thee to be drawn firop it.' " . 
. This narrative was so full pf pature, chivalry, 
simplicity, a&d poetry, that wp could opt resist 
quoting it in full. After this greeting, the knight^ 
together with Arthur and his retinue, returned to 
Caerlleon $ and the following passage still further 
shews the amorousness of the atmosphere in 
.these parte. 

"And* the first night Peredur came to Caerl- 
4eon, to Arthur's court, and as he walked in the 
city after his repast, behold, there met him 
Angharad Law Eurawc. ' By my faith* sister, 9 
said Peredur, ' thou art a beauteous and lovely . 
maiden; and were it pleasing to thee,. I could 
love thee above all women.' " 

The legend does not precisely inform us as to 
whether this was. the lady on whom he had been 
before pondering, though it appears probable; 
Jbowbeit, he assuredly got a very ungentle answer. 


HIS SUCCESS, 15 

ct * I pledge my faith/ said she, * that I do not 
love thee, nor will I ever do so.' " 

•Notwithstanding this rebuff, her admirer was 
nothing daunted. " 4 I also pledge my faith,' said 
Peredur, * that I will never speak a word to any 
christian again, until thou come to love me above 
all men/ " And Peredur kept his word so rigour- 
ously that he obtained the name of the Dumb 
Youth; and furthermore, Peredur gained his vic- 
tory over the lady. After various adventures and 
some lapse of time, we are told that Angharad 
Law Eurawc again met him, but without recog- 
nising his person-; " ' I declare to heaven, chief- 
taia,' said she, c wpful is it that thou canst not 
speak ; for eotildert thou speak, I would love thee 
best of all men ; #od by my faith, although thou 
•cmsk not, I do bve thee best of all.' 

" 'Heaven reward thee, my sister,' said Pere- 
dur ; 'by my feith I do also love thee/" 

After this happy triumph, Jet no swain despair, 
albeit his lady do sot at first seem kindly dis- 
posed. Some there be who say that perseverance 
will not bend a woman's wiU, and that if she is 
not disposed to love to-day, neither will die be 
disposed to-morrow. He who *poke thus, me- 
thinks, had never been loved at all, either yester- 
day, to-day, or to-morrow, and to-morrow up to 
the end of his life. We know one who put the 
following stanza into the mouth of a fair maiden, 


16 PERSEVERANCE IN LOVE. 

when she had to reprove her persecutor for being 
too importunate, videlicet : 

" Pray leave me, if thou courtest mine esteem ; 
This heart is mine, if that thou seekest still ;• 
Thou hast my mind, — then why, oh idly dream 
That perseverance moves a woman's will ? " 

Other knights, however, besides Peredur have 
proved the fallacy of such assertions; for it is 
only 'those who persevere in being disagreeable 
that cannot move a woman's will by time ; since 
those who go to work modestly, meekly, and 
deferentially, will, for the most part, compass their 
end. Have we not known twenty young folks of 
the opposite sexes come together, who, at their 
first acquaintanceship were not only indifferent, 
but were absolutely disagreeable to each other ! 
and yet, have we not known that time and better 
knowledge of their several dispositions and virtues, 
have so changed the aspect of their opinions, that 
many of them have, in the. event, sworn matri- 
mony to each other for good or bad, for better 
for worse, all the days of their existence. Let all 
swains therefore hold up Peredus, Jthe Prince of 
Sunshine, as a cheering precedent^ bever allowing 
themselves to be stricken down • by one blow, or 
defeated by incipient difficulties. 


j 


THE PICTS. 17 


• CHAPTER II. 

The Picts. — First Gretna Nuptials. — Origin of Chaucer's 
"Wife's Tale."— Arthur and the Grim Baron.— The Grim 
Lady. — The. Secret revealed. — Gawaine's Magnanimity.-— 
Fetching the Bride.— The Reward of Friendship.— The 
Bride's Tale. — The First Marriage at Gretna. 


The marriage of Sir Gawaine : and 

Important 'tis, I ween ; 
Because this is the first that e'er 

Was done at Gretna Green. 

In former times the modern territory of Gretna 
Green, now about to be celebrated, formed part 
and parcel of the Roman province of Valencia, 
so called by Tacitus. Then, in aftertimes, came 
the Picts, picking their way from the north country ; 
and nice pickings they got from the bones of 
their predecessors, who had retired but a short 
space before : here awhile they feasted and bat- 
tened, until such time as they had picked the said' 
bones clean, when they crossed the river Sark 
for more, broke over the works of Severus, and 
invaded the merriment that ever reigned with 


18 FIRST GRETNA NUPTIALS. 

King Arthur in merry Carlisle. Then, behold, 
arose, like an exhalation, this mirror of chivalry, 
and his notable paladins ; and the herein-before- 
mentioned territory became the district of Reged 
in the kingdom of Strath-Clyde and Cumbria, 
famous also as having been the laiyl over which 
Rhyderc, or Roderic, the Magnificent, reigned 
with great pomp and circumstance,, and also 
wherein the enchanter Merlin prophesied. 

Now about this era the great Spirit of Affec- 
tion breathed violent love into the atmosphere 
qf these parts, so that knights were heavy of heart 
when the day was light, and then essayed to 
become lighter when it was dark, by speaking 
amiable words to fair forms, which appeared &fc 
turret windows o 1 nights. Every state of exis- 
tence hath ".an end in view;"* every under- 
taking a wifthed-fpr consummation; every race a 
winning post; and every project a' goal: whexer 
fore, no man ever falleth into honourable Jove but 
what his " end in view," — his consummation hjs 
winning post, and his go$l, will be matrimpny* 
Thus it has been with many a doughty hero ; 
and it now become? us to record the nuptials of 
that famous Round Table Knight Sir Gstwaine, 
whose, espousals were celebrate^ here, in a regioi} 
which has ever since his day been so renowned 
both for love, and for love's end in view, consum- 
mation, winding-post, and goal. 


L 


ORIGIN OF CHAUCER'S WIFE'S TALE. 19 

On these nuptials we lay great stress, because 
they are the first of any note actually occurring 
in or near Gretna* which we can, narrate from 
authentic chronicles for the information of the 
companionable reader, and consequently their im- 
portance, in a historical point of view, will be 
readily accorded by him or her, seeing that they 
stand up like a beacon of a dark night, shining 
brightly through the surrounding obscurity of such 
remote ages, and at the same time offer a fair 
precedent to commence from. 

" King Arthur lives in merry Carlisle, 

And seemly is to see ; 
And there with him Queen Guenever, 

That bride so bright of blee," 

Thus begins the chronicle above alluded to ; 
a chronicle, as antiquaries tell us, which furnish- 
ed the venerable Chaucer with the theme for his 
" Wife's Tale. 1 ' At the date of our story, these 
sovereigns were revelling in Christmas festivities, 
dispensing hospitality to all the brave and the 
gentle of their court : and one day, whilst they 
sat at the-well garnished board spread upon the 
dais, behold a young and beautiful damsel entered 
the hall of the castle, and threw herself at the 
feet of the king, craving of him " a boon." This, 
according to the usage of chivalry, was incon- 
tinently granted, without stopping to inquire 


£0 ARTHUR AND THE GRIM BARON. 

what pains or penalties it might impose upon the 
granter : and then the lady proceeded to say, that 
a " grim baron," whom they met by hazard the 
day before, had sorely misused her, and had 
carried away her lover captive to his " bower." 
This wanton outrage kindled the ire of the com- 
pany, and Arthur loudly called for his horse, and 
his sword Excalibar, swearing that he would 
avenge the maiden, and never leaye the grim 
baron until he had. made him quail. Wherefore, 
having accoutred himself, he hastened away in 
search of his foe : but, alas and well-a-day for 
chivalry and King Arthur ! the baron's castle stood 
upon enchanted ground — and what mortal man, be 
he vavasour or villain, could ever contend against 
witchery? 

" On magic ground. the castle stood, 

And fenced with many a spell ; 
No valiant knight could tread thereon, 

But strait his courage fell. 

" Forth then rushed that Carlisle* knight— 
m Kmg Arthur felt the charm ; 
His sturdy sinews lost their strength, 
Down sunk his feeble arm. 

" Now yield thee ! yield thee ! King Arthur ; 

Now yield thee unto me : 
Or light with me, or lose thy land : 

No better terms may be." 

These terms' imposed by this " grim baron," 
were hard terms certainly for the King of Britain 


TUB GRIM LADY. 21 

ttad the prince of knighthood ; but one loophole 
of escape still remained, and one proviso was still 
offyred to the prostrate Arthur. If, indeed, he 
would swear by the Rood and promise by his faye, 
that fce would return upon next New Year's Day 
and b^ing his enchanted conqueror word, "what 
it is that all women most desire," then in that 
case he would be allowed to depart and return 
to Carlisle. This condition was to be his ran* 
som, and cruelly he was constrained to wound 
his honour and submit. 

u King Arthur then held up his hand, 

And sware upon his faye; 
Then took his leave of the grim baron, 

And fast he rode away. 

" And he rode east, and he rode west, 

And did of all inquire 
What thing it is all women crave, 

And what they most desire. 

" Some told him riches, pomp, or state,— 

Some raiment fine and bright, — 
Some told him mirth, some flattery,— 

And some a gallant knight." 

• 

In this perplexity he sped about over the wil- 
derness sorely troubled with doubts and mis- 
givings ; for, as each person " told a different 
thing," he could in no wise satisfy his mind, and 
come to a conclusion. As he rode, ruthfully across 
a moor, he espied a lady sitting between an oak and 
a green holly, dressed in " red scarlet," but she 


22 THE SECRET REVEALED. 

was so dreadfully deformed of person and so un- 
comely of feature, that no one could look at her 
without disgust and loathing. Her nose was 
crooked, her chin was all awry, she had an eye, 
not in h£r forehead like Polyphemus, but where 
perhaps it was, if possible worse, that is, even 
where her mouth ought to have been ; and her 
hair, like serpents, clung about her pallid and cada- 
verous 'cheeks. As he approached, she accosted 
the King in deemly language, but he was so 
stricken with her disgracious appearance, that he 
was unable to reply. Somewhat moved to anger 
at his silence, she demanded what wight he was, 
that did not deign to speak ? adding, that per- 
chance she might be able to ease his pain, albeit 
" foul to see." Encouraged by this possibility 
of alleviation, he addressed the " grim lady," by 
declaring, that if peradventure she could help 
him in -his need, he would grant her any favour 
she might ask of him. fehe then revealed to him 
the important secret that should serve as his ran- 
som fi^m the baron ; and which, in fine was, that 
"All women like to have their will— this was 
their chief desire;" at the same time reserving to 
herself, as a reward for her service, that he should 
find some courtly knight who would come and 
marry her. Arthur returned to Gnenever his 
queen, and to his paladins, rejoiced, of a verity, 
that he had been rescued from the wizard power 


GAWAllSfE'S MAGNANIMITY. 23 

of his foe, but pitebusly grieved at reflecting oh 
the (mih he had sworn to the deformed lady who 
had communicated the secret ; in the first place, 
believing that no knight would ever, from dis- 
interestedness, and scarcely from loyalty, wed so 
loathsome a creatiire : ; and, secondly, it pained 
him much ^Vfcn to suffer any friend, who might 
be willing from magnanimity, to make so great 
a sacrifice of his happiness, as to become united 
to her merely out of pure love to his prince. And 
surely, any one who could start up and offer him- 
self on such a shrine, were indeed a pattern for 
true friendship, allegiance, and devotion. These 
perplexing matters he duly set forth when he 
readied Carlisle city ; but his .generous nephew, 
Sir Gawaine, to the astonishment and admiration 
of all then present, and of all , posterity ever since, 
arose and resolutely offered himself as his uncle's 
deliverer, as ye may here see in the legend : 

" Then bespake him Sir Gawaine, 

That Was ever a gentle knight : 
1 That loathly lady I will wed, 
Therefore be merry and light.' 

"'Now nay, now nay, good Sir Gawaine, 
My sister's son ye be ; 
This loathly lady 's all too grim 
And all too foul for ye.' " 

Then' the tortafed uncle Recapitulates the appal- 
ling catalogue of her deformities; but still his 


24 FETCHING THE BRIDE, 

kinsman, stedfast in his virtue, persists ia sacri- 
ficing himself for the sake of Arthur. He pro- 
ceeds — 

«< What though her chin stand all^awry, 
And she be foul to see, 
I '11 mftrry her, uncle, for thy sake, 
. And 1 11 thy ransom be ! ' 

"'Now thanks, now thanks, good Sir Gawaine, 
And a blessing thee 'betide ; 
To-morrow we '11 have knights and squires, 
And we 11 go fetch the bride/ " 

Bent on this resolution, they departed next day 
for the moor, accompanied by Sir Launcelet, Sir 
Stephen, Sir Kay, Sir Banier, Sir Bore, Sir Gar- 
ratt, Sir Tristrem, and others of equal renown ; 
and when they came to the forest, there, forsooth, 
they found the lady, clad in " red scarlet" as here- 
tofore, sitting beneath a holly-tree. At the sight 
of her, Sir Kay, or Kai, who in all the old ro- 
mances and fabliaux is uniformly described as 
being very uncourteous in speech and bearing, is 
sorely unmannered in his observations, until the 
volunteer bridegroom calls him to account ; add- 
ing, that, let her appearance be what it may, still 
some one among them must take her to wife. 

(( ' Many* i'faith/ then said Sir Kay, 
' F the devil's name anon ; 
Get me a wife wherever I may, 
In sooth she shall be none.' " 

The courtiers were so disgusted at the issue of 
their progress, that they appear rather disposed 


THE REWARD OF FRIENDSHIP. 25 

hastily to take up their hawks and hounds and 
depart, than to tarry on Ahe moor dallying about 
the lady, declaring that indeed they would not 
any of them wed her " for cities, nor for towns." 

'" Peace, lordlings, peace !' Sir Gawaine said, 
' Nor make debate and strife ; 
This loathly lady I will take, 
And marry her to wife/ 

" Then up they took that loathly dame, 

And home anon they bring ; 

And there Sir Gawaine he her wed, 

And married her with a ring." 

> 

An affectionate and disinterested act to serve 
a friend, is never without its guerdon; and the 
moral appended to this tale, and the just reward 
that came upon Sir Gawaine, is passing good, as 
ye may here read in the stanzas following : — 

" And when they were In wed-bed laid, 
And all were done away, — 
' Come turn to me, my own wed lord, 
Come turn to me, I pray.' 

" Sir Gawaine scant could lift his head, 
For sorrow and for care ; 
When lo, instead of that loathly dame, 
He saw a young lady fair ! 

" Sweet blushes stained her rud-red cheek, 
Her eyes were black as sloe, 
The ripening cherry swelled her lip, 
And all her neck was snow. 

" Sir Gawaine kissed that lady fair, 
Lying upon the sheet, 

VOL. I. C 


26 THE bride's tale* 

And swore, as he was a true knight, 

That spice was never so sweet." 

• 

The bride then explains, that her father was an 
aged knight, who took a " false lady " to wife, 
(apparently a step-mother,) who worked her all 
this misfortune ; who, through magic constrained 
her to dwell amidst moors and mosses, woods and 
wilds, until such time as some courtly knight 
should marry her ; and who had also, out of the 
same jealousy, doomed her brother to live in the 
practice of rapine and oppression — to be, in short, 
the "grim baron," albeit he was by birth and 
temperament, the heritor of everything gentle in 
blood and bearing. The spell, she added, was 
now broken, and that she was "herself again." 
Her brother also, had by the same influence be- 
come disenchanted ; that henceforth she should 
be "a true lady," and he " a gentle knight." In 
gratitude to heaven for the good fortune that has 
thus unexpectedly settled upon him, and with 
increased love towards her at the transformation, 
he gives himself up entirely to his wife, reserving 
no authority, no power, no dominion, but vowing 
that she shall ever "have all her will," which 
words, as the reader inay recall, bore away the 
important secret that ransomed King Arthur. 

Hence we are pleasantly instructed that to have 
their will, is to have that which all ladies most 
desire — a fact of easy belief, seeing that if they 


FIRST MARRIAGE AT GRETNA. 27 

have their will, they have every Want, wi S h,.whim, 
and luxury whatsoever at instant command. Me- 
thinks, that if the axiom had been extended to 
men, there would have arisen up but few of that 
sex who would hare declared it false. This 
ancient idea hath been prettily worked out by a 
more recent versifier in the form of a laconic 
epigram, as ye may here see, videlicet : 

" Kind Peggy kissed her husband with these words, 
'Mine own sweet Will, how dearly I love thee !' 
' If true,' quoth Will, ' the world none such affords.' 

And that 'tis true I dare her warrant be ; 
For ne'er was woman yet, or good or ill, 
But loved always best her own sweet Will." 

We do not insist that this marriage was really 
celebrated on the site of the present renowned 
marrying establishment ycleped Gretna Hall, or 
" The Hall " in the vicinage ; but, this is the 
first execution occurring in or near this region of 
which we have discovered any the most remote 
mention on the musty vellum of apttjpfflt 
fctOfipfepU. And the importance of the first 
marriage happening at a place, or near a place, 
(for the ancients were very bad geographers, and 
were pot particular in noting localities,) will be 
readily admitted, when we recollect that the ob- 
ject of this work is to record the matrimonial 
transactions that have befallen on this amorous 
soil. . • 

o2 


28 LEGEND OF KING ARTHUR, 


CHAPTER III. 


Legend of King Arthur, and Sir Owain. 


How Arthur went to sleep one day 

Whilst sitting in his chair ; 
And how Sir Owain, with great essay, 

Subdued a lady fair. 

Not only do the legends of Britain teem with 
records of murder, as being the chiefest delight of 
our forefathers, but the same spirit runs through 
the legends and traditions of all other countries 
whatsoever. We need but to refer to the Neibe- 
lungen Lay, wherein the manners of our more 
remote Scandinavian progenitors are duly pictured 
forth; and here we shall see that the greatest, 
virtue in this world, was to have butchered the 
greatest number of our fellow creatures, and the 
greatest bliss in the next, the quaffing the blood 
of our enemies put of their own skulls. 

Asgardia, the paradise of Odin, who himself 
was styled Oal Fadr, or Val Fadr, the Father of 
Slaughter in the Runic, and Val-Halla, the Hall 


AND SIR OWAIN. 29 

of Slaughter, are names indicative of the prevail- 
ing turn of men's minds. None were considered 
worthy to go to Val-Halla except such as died 
in war or by violence — so ignominious was it con- 
sidered to die reposedly in bed ; and this same 
notion appears in some sort to have come down 
to the Turks and Tartars, who look to a place 
in the Seventh Heaven. Such puny and des- 
picable wretches as died peaceably at home, were 
consigned to a place designated Hel^ the meothesis 
of suffering and ease, — a region wherein the 
dwellers seem to have been oppressed with what 
we term ennui, not pleasure, and yet not positive 
suffering; a sort of negative existence, tedious^ 
tiring, and wearisome. But the place of actual 
torture, the hell, the bottomless pit, the gehenna, 
this" dreadful dungeon of horror, was ycleped 
'Nixleim ; and to the excruciating torments of 
Nixleim the ill-natured were devoted. Hence ill- 
nature in this world was held the greatest crime of 
which man could be guilty, and deserving of the 
greatest punishment which the imagination of 
man could devise f and hence, also, we learn how 
highly the possession of good-nature and courteous 
bearing was rated, even in an. age so barbarous. 
This fact strikes us as the great redeeming pomt 
to all the other savage practices of the Teutonic 
race ; that amidst their extreme degradation, their 
love of ruthless war, as being the only manly and 


SO LEGEND OF KING ARTHUR, 

honourable pastime, and their delight in ven- 
geance, oppression, and indiscriminate slaughter, 
this quality of good-nature should be considered 
so highly.; or, which is the same thing, that ill- 
nature should be looked upon as deserving the 
cruellest retribution which the flames # and the 
demons of their gehenna could inflict. 

If these savages could so dearly prize an 
amiable mind, when the softer qualities were less 
in demand, how much more shall we, now in an 
age of civilization, polish, and courtesy, uphold a 
possession so fair, so sweet, so beauteous to behold? 

In the later ages of chivalry, we hear less of 
this thirst for blind murder, and more of gentle 
manners. Knights fought then, not so much for 
the sake of committing slaughter, as for the sake 
of putting down the despotic and oppressive ;' and 
as it was a great virtue to be bold in the field, 
so also it was no less a virtue to be courteous 

in the bower and the hall. Sir Owain is thus 

i 

commended for his sweetness by the old chro- 
niclers, and Sir Kai is denounced by them for 
being blunt, cross, rude, and ungentle in speech. 

One day King Arthur was sitting in the prin- 
cipal chamber of his palace at Gaerlleon, sur- 
rounded by several of his noble vassals, together 
with his queen the Princess Gwenhwyvar, and 
her handmaidens, some of the company amusfog 
themselves relating stories of great achievements, 


AND SIR OWAIN. SI 

and others busied* about suck other pastimes as 
best consorted with their fancies. The king sat 
in the centre of the apartment upon a seat of 
green rushes, over which was spread a covering 
of flame^coloured satin; and a cushion of red 
satin supported his elbow. " Flame-colour," or 
rather yelkw~red, as the word mtlyngoch in the 
original signifies, was a dye of which the ancients 
were very fond, as it is frequently mentioned by 
the troubadours and minstrels of the middle ages, 
especially when alluding to costly stuffs pertain- 
ing to princes and vavasours; and even now-a- 
days in Wales, amongst the most unsophisticated 
of the Kymri, this hue tints many of the garments 
worn by the women. The cushion was an in- 
dispensable in every chamber; guests and way- 
farers were welcomed and made comfortable by 
their entertainers by the act of presenting them 
with cushions to sit or recline pn ; and the old 
triplet sets it forth as one of three things that a 
man could hardly do without, as thus : v 

" Tri pheth gweddus i wr eu bod yn ei dy, — 

€€ Ei wraig yn ddiwair ; 
Ei glustog yn ei gadair ; 
A'i dely yn gywair." 

" Three things proper for a man to have in his 
house,— 

." A virtuous wife ; # 

His cushion in his chair ; 
And his harp in tune." 


:32 LEGEND OF KINO ARTHUR, 

And as the son of PendragoU sat there, he grew 
a little drowsy whilst waiting for his dinner, but 
not forgetting dignity to himself, or politeness to 
his friends, he spoke thus: — "If I thought you 
would not disparage me, I would sleep while I 
•wait for my repast; and you can entertain one 
another with relating tales, and can obtain a 
flagon of mead and some meat from Kai." Then 
he leant back and took a nap. The seneschal, 
or dapifer, Sir Kai, went to the cellar for mead 
and a golden goblet, and soon returned, likewise 
bringing " a handful of skewers upon which were 
.broiled coUops of meat." Having discussed this, 
and then having modestly contended amongst 
themselves as to who should not tell the tale, by 
framing many coy and pretty excuses, Kynon, 
the son of Clydno, is finally prevailed on, and he 
relates his strange adventures in the Forest of 
Breceliande. T^e hearing of this so stirred up 
the curiosity and love of adventure in the bosom 
of Sir Owain, one of the listeners, that he set off 
the very next day toward the same forest, — a 
proceeding which led to his marriage with the 
widowed countess, as we will tell anon. 

He journeyed on through a valley, in the midst 
of which ran a river, until such time as he came 
to a stately castle at the end of it, where he 
beheld 4wo youths with yellow hair, clad in gar- 
ments of yellow satin, and each with a frontlet 


AND SIR OWAIN. 33 

of gold on his head, and golden clasps upon their 
insteps. They each bore an ivory bow strung 
with the sinews of the stag, " and they were 
shooting their daggers." Then he greeted an old 
man, who introduced him into the castle, where 
he was disarrayed by four and twenty beauteous 
damsels, who nad been sitting at the window 
embroidering satin ; and in place of his own 
habiliments, they dressed him in an under vest 
and a doublet of fine linen, a robe, a surcoat, and 
a mantle of yellow satin, trimmed with a broad 
gold band. They placed cushions both beneath 
and around him; they brought silver bowls for 
him to wash in, and linen towels to dry himself 
with, 'some being white and some green. He 
feasted sumptuously, waited on by some of the 
damsels, and then the aged man entered into 
conversation. Owain told him that he had come 
that way, bent upon attempting an adventure in 
which Kynon had previously been foiled and over- 
thrown, namely, that of fighting with the Black 
Knight who guarded the Fountain. After smiling 
at his fool-hardiness, the man reluctantly gave him 
every necessary information, and Owain took his 
course through the country as directed. 

Many strange haps bring him to an open plain, 
wherein stood a large tree covered with intensely 
green foliage, beneath which was the fountain ; 

beside the fountain there was a large slab of 

c 5 


c 


34 LEGEND OF KINO ARTHUR, 

• 

marble, and on the slab, attached to it by a chain, 
there stood a bowl of silver. Acting as directed, 
he took the bowl, and threw a bowlful of water 
upon the stone; and immediately his ears were 
greeted with a most terrific peal of thunder, to- 
gether with a shower of hailstones so violent, that 
he was fain to lift his shield over himself and his 
horse's head for safety. The weather then be- 
came fair, but every leaf that had been upon the 
tree was gone. Soon afterwards a flight of birds 
came and settled upon the branches, and sung a 
sweeter strain than ever Owain had heard in all 
his life before, in the midst of which he was sud- 
denly pained by the sound of something like mur- 
muring and complaining. Then appeared a knight 
on a black horse making hastily towards him, 
clothed in black armour and trappings of black 
velvet, and with a pennon on the head of his spear 
of the same sable hue. Now, whilst Arthur was 
sleeping, and Kynon was relating to Gwenhwyvar 
and the rest, all the particulars of his encounter 
with this defender of the glade, as it occurred to 
him before the same was undertaken by Owain, 
he set forth how that the knight unhorsed him 
by the fury of his onset, and then when he was 
overthrown, how he passed the shaft of his black 
lance through the bridle rein of his horse, riding 
away with it together with his own, leaving Sir 
Kynon on the ground, not deigning even to bestow 


AND SIR OWAIN. 35 

so much notice oh him as to imprison him, or 
despoil hiur of his arms. He also pleasantly told, 
how that when he returned discomfitted back by 
the way he had come, and met the man who had 
directed him to the Fountain, *' it was a iparvel 
that he did not melt down into a liquid pool, 
through the shame he felt at the man's derision." 

Howbeit, Sir Owain either had better luck or 
better address, for it fared differently with him, 
and of a truth, it fared differently with this foul 
paynim. Having spurred against each other so 
* rigorously as to break both their lances, they drew 
their swords and fought blade to blade. " Then 
Owain, 1 ' saith the Llyfr Coch o Hergest, " struck 
the knight a blow through his helmet, head-piece, 
and visor, and through the skin, and the flesh, 
and the bone, until it wounded the very brain." 
Feeling that he had at last received a mortal 
wound, he incontinently turned his horse's head 
and fled toward his castle. Owain pursued so close 
upon him that they both galloped over the draw- 
bridge together, but here the portcullis was let 
' down upon them by the warders with a sudden 
crash. The knight of the castle sped through 
the gateway into the court, "and the portcullis," 
continues the legend, " was let fall upon Owain ; 
and it struck his horse behind the saddle, and cut 
him in two, and carried away the rowels of the 
spurs that were upon Owain's heels.'" Of a verity 


o 


36 LEGEND OF KING ARTHUR, 

this was " coming it close." Owain was now in 
a cage. "And the portcullis descended to the 
floor. And the rowels of the spurs and part of 
the horse were without, and Owain, with the 
other part of the horse remained between the two 
gates, and the inner gate was closed, so that 
Owain could not go thence ; -and Owain was in a 
perplexing situation." Perplexing indeed, — and 
no marvel either. 

Whilst here, he could peep through . a hole in 
the gate, and he could see a fair and spacious 
street with houses on each side; in this street* 
he perceived a beauteous damsel, having yellow 
curling hair, a frontlet of gold on her forehead, 
shoes of variegated leather on her feet, and a 
vesture of yellow silk thrown over her graceful 
form. She approached the gate, desiring that it 
might be opened ; but the enclosed hero laments 
his inability to do so, saying that it is no more in 
his power for him to serve her, than it may be 
hers to serve him in such a " perplexing situation." 
Then responded she: — "Truly, it is very sad 
that thou canst not be released, and every woman 
ought to succour thee, for I never saw one more 
faithful in the service of ladies than thou. As a 
friend thou art the most sincere, and as a lover 
the most devoted." Upon that she presents him 
with a ring, telling him to turn the stone inwards 
and to close his fingers upon it, adding, that as 


AND SIR OWAIN % 37 

long as he concealed the stone, it would indeed 
conceal him. Through the efficacy of this gift he 
evades his enemies, who soon returned to him -to 
take vengeance ; he invisibly follows his deliverer 
to a place of safety, where she restores him with 
a sumptuous feast and courteous entertainment. 

Not long after this, the nobleman who owned 
the castle dies of the wounds he had received of 
Owain, and the "Countess of the Fountain, 11 his 
widow, with whom Owain was desperately smitten 
as he saw her amidst the mourners of the funeral 
procession, but not at that time knowing who she 
was, remained alone in her possessions, unpro- 
tected herself, and unable to defend her territory 
from her rapacious ancUlawless neighbours. On 
being so struck with he,r beauty, Owain asks his 
companion who she might be ? The maiden 
answers him that she is the Countess of the Foun- 
tain, and her mistress. " Verily, 11 said Owain, 
" she is the woman that I love best. 11 " Verily, 11 
said the maiden, "she shall also love thee not a 
little. 11 Having said this, she determined to pave 
the way to her mistress^ heart for her guest ; 
thinking, according to the idea of the times, that 
none could be so fit to defend the lady's acres, 
and hills, and mansions, as a knight so doughty, 
and at the same time so full of service to the 
softer sex. " Come here and sleep, 11 said she, 
addressing him with this intention; "and 1 will 


88 LEGEND OF KING ARTHUR, 

go and woo for thee." So Owain slept, and the 
. maiden went to the castle. 

When she arrived thither, she found her mis- 
tress in a woful plight, mourning and wailing in 
such sort, that she was unable to endure the sight 
of any one. Her bower- woman, whose name was 
Luned, as we are now informed, then saluted her 
with meet inquiries ; but receiving no answer, she 
craves to know how it is, and what ails her that 
she cannot speak ? The countess here reproaches 
Luned that she has not been near her so long, but 
has retired herself away even when her affliction 
most needed consolation and society. The maiden 
reproves her lady for giving way to a useless grief, 
since her good lord wa%gone, and no excess of 
tears could recall him. The countess declares 
there is not a man in the whole "Varsal 'orld that 
can compare with her lamented husband; but 
Luned dissents from her here, hinting that she 
knows better, and that she knows of some great 
advantage that might accrue to her mistress. 
Words, howbeit, run so high, that the attendant 
hastily quits the presence of the countess on hav- 
ing delivered these sentiments, and hopes that evil 
may betide the one who shall make the first ad- 
vancement towards reconciliation. Yet was the 
haughty lady's curiosity excited, insomuch that 
she burned to know what Luned bad to say ; and 
here follows a passage of exquisite nature : — " The 


AND SIR OWAIN. 89 

countess arose and followed her to the door of the 
chamber, and began coughing loudly. And when 
Lnned looked back, the countess beckoned to her ; 
and she returned to the countess.' 1 These ma- 
noeuvres indeed brought about a reconciliation ; 
the lady was content to listen, and her bower- 
woman to woo for Owain in his absence. 

" Thou knowest," said Lnned, " that except by 
warfare and-arms it is impossible for thee to pre- 
serve thy possessions; delay not, therefore, to 
seek some one who can defend them." 

" And how can I do that ?" said the coftntess. 

" I will tell thee," said Luned ; " unless thou 
canst defend the fountain, thou canst not maintain 
thy dominions ; and no one can defend the foun- 
tain, except it be a knight of Arthur's household ; 
and I will go to Arthur's court, and ill betide me, 
if I return thence without a warrior who can 
guard the fountain, as well as, or even better, 
than he who defended it formerly." 

" That will be hard to perform," said the coun- 
tess. " Go, however, and make proof of that 
which thou hast promised." 

This artful conference being ended, the maid 
retired ; but in place of going to Arthur's court 
at Caerlleon, she only hastened back to Owain ; 
she related what had passed, an'd prepared the 
knight for an interview with her mistress. Oif 
the day appointed, Owain arrayed himself in a 


40 LEGEND OF KING ARTHUR, 

coat, and a surcoat, find a mantle of yellow satin, 
— a colour in especial* esteem with the ancients, 
as the old romances portray — and upon the last 
was a broad band of gold lace ; and on his feet 
he put high shoes of variegated leather, fastened 
with golden clasps wrought into the form of 
lions. 

" The next day," (after the presentation,) saith 
the Llyfr Coch, " the countess caused* all her sub- 
jects to assemble, and showed them that her earl- 
dom was left defenceless, and that it could not 
be protected but with horse and arms, and mili- 
tary skill. 4 Therefore,' said she, ' this is what I 
offer for your choice ; either let one of you take 
me, or give your consent for me to .take a hus- 
band from elsewhere, to defend my dominions.' " 

" So they came to the determination that it was 
better that she should have permission to marry 
some one from elsewhere ; and thereupon she sent 
for the bishops and archbishops, to celebrate her 
nuptials with Owain. And the men of the earl- 
dom did Owairi homage. 1 ' 

In this narrative, which has been so ably done 
into English by Lady Guest, and parts of which 
we have given verbatim to the reader, a charac- 
teristic trait of the manners of the times in which 
it was written 'is pleasantly set forth. A poor 
knight, who possessed hardihood and valour, had 
every chance of fighting his way into the bosom 


AND SIR OWAIN. 41 

and territories of any rich heiress or widow what- 
soever; for in those days, when "might was 
right," and the best title-deed was a strong arm, 
the great solicitude of well-portioned ladies was, 
to discover a stalwart knight who should preserve 
their lands from the depredations of their neigh- 
bours. Every trivial misunderstanding was settled 
by the lance and the sword ; and he who unhorsed 
his adversary, possessed himself of his property. 
Amongst the many advantages of knighthood, as 
creditably and valorously borne by men of gentle 
blood, St. Palaye does not omit this as one by 
which courage and address may come poor into 
lists, and retire covered with honour, riches, and 
the love of the fair sex. For, as a lady's posses- 
sions were nothing to her unless she could keep 
them, and as in the plenitude of chivalry and 
knight-errantry, it was matter of course for her 
to love and to marry, and as again, owing to the 
unsettled and troublous state of the times, the 
man most deserving of love, was the man most 
capable of defending the weak or delicate from 
oppression, so it was natural for her to select, 
independent of any innate or intrinsic virtue, the 
greatest muscular strength, valour, perseverance, 
and hardihood, that could centre in one and the 
same individual ; indeed, these external qualifica- 
tions argued and supposed every mental virtue of 
which the person of a man could be possessed. 


42 THE ANCIENT 


CHAPTER IV. 

Ancient Kings of Scotland. — Wars between the Britons, 

Danes, and Saxons. 


The many warlike, famous kings 
That reigned o'er parts of Scotland ; 

They did such fierce and fiery things, 
They rendered it a hot land. 

After Fingal and his Caledonian warriors de- 
feated Caracalla, as he marshalled his host beneath 
the wings of the Roman eagle, perpetual hostilities 
befel savagely between the two nations for several 
generations of men. It was in the year 211 that 
the battle, to which we refer, took place. Ossian 
afterwards, in the palace of Selma,— that stood 
upon the rock by the water side, and at whose 
base were the white sands he speaks of, (which, 
by the way, are now brown,) and also, when the 
wind was favourable, within hearing of the roaring 
tide that rushed over the rocky ledge of Cona, 
and within sight of the most ancient castle of 
Donstaffnage across Loch Etive, — there sang tlje 
deeds of heroes achieved on this bloody field. 
There, whilst the wilk, brimming with mead, was 
quaffed by the. chiefs, whose spears now leant 


c 


KINGS OF SCOTLAND. 43 

against the wall, — there did Ossian strike the 
harp, and tell how Caracal closed his wings of 
pride and fled before the hardy sons of Albin. 

The northern tribes continued unceasingly to 
assail the works of Adrian, whenever there was 
any chance of compassing any good to themselves, 
or any evil toward their foes; and in these at- 
tacks they were repelled by a succession of Roman 
commanders during two centuries. 

After the meteoric Arthur had descended to the 
grave, like a falling star that shoots from its sphere 
on high, where it had been the light of .the world, 
then, over those amorous parts lying round about 
the pleasant shores of the Solway, the fierce spirit 
of contention took dwelling within the bosoms of 
men ; so that dire and cruel wars set them quarrel- 
ling together. 

The authentic records of these times are scarce 
and obscure ; the meager fragments of history that 
have come down to us from certain agtttpiltt 
&?OnpttffIl0 can hardly be accredited; and if it 
were not for the purer light of tradition, (which 
is always the truest part of history,) we should 
be lamentably deficient in all that folates to . the 
sun-rising — the early dawn of Scottish afiairs. 

The Scoto-Hibernian tribe of the Dalriads from 
the Green Island, were located in the country of 
the Epidii, or on that p&rt of Caledonia which is 
now the western half of Argyleshire ; and they 


44 WARS BETWEEN THE 

were spreading themselves from this point in radii 
over the land, much to the annoyance of their 
neighbours, whose homes they invaded. It is an 
unpleasant thing to have ones house and home 
entered by strangers. These colonies were led by 
the three stalwart sons of Ere, severally ycleped 
Loam, Fergus, and Angus, the second of whom 
(Fergus) being afterwards the progenitor of a long 
line of kings in Scotland. 

Whilst these things were doing amongst the 
Kelts and Dalriads of the north, the Jutes, Hen- 
gist and* Horsa, were cutting bull-hides into 
thongs, after the effeminate yet classic ensample 
of the lady Dido, and were measuring out land 
in Thanet, whereon to ensconce themselves. Is 
it not rational to suppose that the old term/of a 
hide of land took its rise from this act of Hengist ? 

These ealdormen, or chieftains, with their fol- 
lowers, 'arrived in three keels, or vessels; and 
Vortigern, u one of the Three Drunkards of Bri- 
tain," as celebrated in the Triads, sent them cards 
of invitation, courteously bidding them come and 
crush a cup of metheglin with him and his family. 
Rowena tod the Paep-frael bowl together were 
irresistible ; Hengist married the one, and quaffed 
the other. The son-in-law then fought the battles 
of his new sire, and received ample territory in 
recompense. But it has been well said that, 
" where much is given, much will be required. 1 * 


BRITONS, DANES, AND SAXONS. 45 

The . demands of the strangers increased in pro- 
portion to the liberality of the Britons ; so that, 
not content with what had been bestowed on 
them, they began to clamour for more ; and when 
this more was refused, they got into a passion and 
tried to snatch it by force. The Jutes even joined 
with the Picts and Scots, and ravaged the lands 
of their late entertainers. This course was nei- 
ther just nor amiable. After divers achievements, 
smacking rather of war than of love, they esta- 
blished themselves finally in the kingrick of Cant- 
wara Land. 

About the same time that the Jutes were con- 
quering Kent, Ella and a pugnacious band of 
Saxons were locating themselves very unceremo- 
niously in Sussex, then the country of the Regni. 
They fought with the Britons, and prevailed on 
them to take flight into the forest of Andreade, 
as the only practicable mode of keeping their souls 
and their bodies identified in one and the same 
individual. 

Advices touching these successes appear to have 
been wafted back to the old Teutons across the 
eastern sea; for not long after Ella had built his 
throne, and had been hailed as the first Bretwalda, 
or Emperor of the Isle of Briton, others of his 
countrymen followed his course, and settled them- 
selves in Hampshire. This they did not do with- 
out a great deal of cutting argument and chop 
logic with the natives, and Geraint their prince, 


46 WARS BETWEEN THE 

who endeavoured in vain, through the rhetoric of 
swords and hatchets, to talk them down. 

Another colony ^debated cruel war with the men 
of Essex, led on by the Supreme Lord, or Suze- 
rain, ycleped iEscwin; and in spite of all that 
the Britons could say to them, in trying to per- 
suade them not to persist in coming, still they 
were so headstrong that they would. 

At this most dreary epocha also, now came 
over the Angles, angling for territory much in the 
same.»way that their ancient neighbours the Jutes 
and Saxons had done. 

So savagely did these tribes demean themselves, 
but more especially the Saxons, who counted the 
greatest numbers, spread themselves over the 
greatest number of hides of land, and committed 
the most cruelty, that men of letters have, judging 
by their stern attributes, shrewdly dived into the 
derivation and origin of the term Saxon. Some 
say it arose from the word seax y the name of the 
short sword which they always wore, and which 
they were so fond of using against their enemies ; 
but Higden, as may be seen in the Polycronycon, 
derives it otherwise. " Men of that cowntree," 
says he, " ben more lyghter and stronger on the 
see, than other scommers or theeves of the see, 
and pursue theyr enemyes fulle harde bothe bye 
water and bye londe, and been called Saxones of 
Saxum, that is, a stone, for they ben as harde as 
stoned, and uneasy to fare withe." 


BRITONS, DANES, AND SAXONS. 47 

The British kingdoms of Deyfyr and Bryneich 
(latinized into Deira and Bernicia), extending from 
the Humber to the British Sea, or Firth of Forth, 
were, according to Palgrave, divided from each 
other by a forest, occupying the tract between 
the Tyne and Tees? and which, unreclaimed by 
man, was abandoned to the wild deer. Properly 
speaking, he further says, this border-land, now 
the bishoprick of Durham, does not seem origin- 
ally to have belonged to either kingdom ; but, in 
subsequent times, the boundary between Deira and* 
Bernicia was usually fixed at the Tyne. The 
Tranehhumbrane countries were much exposed, 
at an early period, to the attacks of the Jutes and 
Saxons* The Britons of Strathclyde and Cumbria, 
whose territory lay on the western side of the 
country, yet stretched over to those places which 
these " scommers, or theeves" were invading, 
aroused themselves and opposed them. 

In these wa*s the natives of Reged, compris- 
ing all the district about Annandale, the shores 
of the Solway, and the Debateable Land, being 
the scene of our history, and over which the 
renowned Urien held his sceptre, took active 
measures to beat back these uncourteous* strangers 
into the ocean from whenfce they had come. But 
Urien, the hero of the bards and -the subject for 
song, found in Ida a .sturdy foe. . This son of 
Angle-land succeeded in. erecting a tower on. a 


48 WARS BETWEEN THE 

lofty promontory of the coast, which served him 
at once both for a castle and a palace. The 
Britons gave it the name of the " Shame of 
Bernicia," so humiliated did they feel at this act 
of their enemies. Ida afterwards bestowed it on 
his queen Bebba, from whom*it took the appella- 
tion of Bebban-Burgh, the burgh or fortress of 
Bebba; and thence became abbreviated into 
Bamborough. 

The separate states of Deira and Bernicia, 
governed for a series of years by Ella or Ida 
and his descendants, who traced back their gene- 
alogy to Woden, were at last united into the one 
sole and independent kingdom of Northumbria. 
Against these the old dwellers of Reged and Cum- 
bria fought frequent and fierce battles. The 
natural boundary that separated them from each 
other, was the ridge of mountains running north 
and south through the island, which has oft- 
times been called the British Apennines. These 
mountains, in this part of modern England, then 
served the original possessors of the soil, in good 
stead against the encroachments of the new comers, 
even as the mountains of Wales protected their 
brethren from the men of Merkenricke or Mercia. 
It is true, these obstacles, in both cases, were 
finally surmounted and passed; but they opposed 
a barrier so formidable, not only from their height 
and ruggedness, but also from the morasses with 


i 


BRITONS, DANES, AND SAXONS. 49 

which they abounded, and from the shelter which 
their crags, glens, and fastnesses gave to the 
besieged, that several centuries elapsed before the 
Saxons could penetrate so far as their western 
sides. # 

The Gododin, an ancient Welsh poem by a 
contemporary bard, tells, in piteous language, of 
the fierce encounters that befel between the natives 
and the Teutons, who had come to molest them. 
The Danes were, perhaps, the most restless, per- 
tinacious, and turbulent of all the various invaders 
of Lloegr : they had succeeded in planting them- 
selves in the northern parts of England (according 
to modern appellation) ; but no sooner found them- 
selves rooted there so firmly as to be without 
fear of eradication by those whom they had dis- 
possessed, than they set out upon new conquests, 
and pierced far into the states of Cumbria, Reged, 
Strathclwyde, Pictavia, and the ScotsJ land. Under 
the command of Halfdane, they spoiled all the 
churches and monasteries of the sometime con- 
verted occupiers of the soil ; and they devastated 
the territories pertaining to the see of St. Cuthbert, 
which comprised, besides that region about the 
ancient forest stretching between the Tees and 
Tyne, the city of Carlisle and a tract of country 
measuring twelve miles around it, including Gretna. 
During these transactions a continual predatory 
warfare was kept up between them and the pre- 

VOL. I. d 


50 WARS BETWEEN THE 

vious habitants; who, by the way, were often 
Saxons, who had, a century or two before, invaded 
the Britons, even as the Danskers were invading 
them. In such countless swarms did they at last 
infest the land, and so ubiquitous did they appear, 
owing to their numbers and the celerity of their 
movements, that the terrified and wonder-stricken 
English used to exclaim, " If thirty thousand 
are slain in one day, there will be double that 
number in the field on the morrow. 11 

The Scandinavian pirates had acquired so much 
fierceness and activity, and these united qualities, 
blending with an insatiable cruelty and passion for 
murder, had brought them so many victories, 
that nothing now appeared likely to stop their 
career until, they should absolutely subjugate the 
whole of Europe. Such a vast design seems 
actually to have been planned by them. They 
not merely overran Great Britain, now so called, 
and the lesser islands pertaining thereto, but they 
landed on the shores of France, and boldly carried 
hostility into the very heart of the country, and. 
even steered their long ships across the Bay of 
Biscay, coasted Portugal, and sailed into the Medi- 
terranean by the Pillars of Hercules. 

It was Scandinavian Heathenism against all 
Christendom. Not a monarch, in Europe but 
trembled for his throne. It was a kind of common 
cause ; and, if they were defeated in one end of 


BRITONS, DAMES, AND SAXONS, 51 

Europe, the other end rejoiced. Thus it* is that, 
when the Scots encountered the Northmen and 
overthrew them in a fierce battle, Charlemagne, in a 
distant region, and reigning over another country 
having no connexion with Scotland, felt that the 
Scots had done him a service by checking the pro- 
gress of the common enemies of one great portion 
of the world. We believe that it was in grateful 
acknowledgment for this good deed that he pro- 
fessed himself and his successors to be ever the 
friendly allies of the Scots, to be their faithful 
reliance and their protection; and, in everduring 
token whereof, the double tressure drawn round 
about the lion on the shield of this kingdom was 
added, an heraldic symbol typifying that France; 
under the badge of the Fleur-de-lis, united by 
bands round the Lion, should be the protector 
of Scotland. 

It is a pleasant thing -if we can, in serving 
ourselves, also at the same time serve our neigh- 
bours. In fighting this battle-field, the Scots cer- 
tainly were intent upon serving themselves; but 
such fair service did they do their brother monaschs 
in the distant neighbourhood, that the thanks of all 
Europe, as well as those of Charlemagne, poured 
in upon them. * 

The descendants of the Romanized Britons, 

occupying what was originally the lands of the 

Ottadini, Selgovse, Gadeni, the Damnii of Clydes- 

d2 


52 WARS BETWEEN THE 

dale, and of the Novantes of Galloway, long 
maintained themselves independent of their Anglo- 
Saxon oppressors ; that is, in so far as this, that, 
although they suffered defeat and persecution from 
them at detached periods too often repeated, still, 
through tact in retiring from them amongst the 
wilder regions of Valencia, as this Roman pro- 
vince was called, or in wisely shunning pitched 
battles when they perceived the foe to be too 
strong for them, they kept themselves a separate 
people, devoted to their own laws, and governed 
by their own Pendragon. 

The jrovince of Valencia, during the supremacy 
of the Roman power, comprised all that territory 
enclosed between the Wall of Lollius Urbicus on 
the north, stretching from the Firth of Clyde to 
the Pictish Sea, and the works of Severus on the 
south, running from Solway Firth to the Tyne. 

The aborigines, now partly Romanized through 
intercourse with their first conquerors, still con* 
tinued to be the prevailing people. Their indi- 
viduality was first weakened when the Teutons 
became ifaasters of their eastern districts of Ber- 
nieia, since called Berwickshire, Lothian, &c, 
an(J compelled them to the adoption of new cus- 
toms and new institutions. They pushed their 
qonquests northwards to the foot of the Grampians, 
and are supposed to have been the founders of the- 
city of Edinburgh, It is more than probable that 


BRITONS, DANES, AND SAXONS. 53 

i,he Britons had long had a dun, or fortress, on the 
commanding and isolated rock now occupied by 
the castle, as stfch an advantageous position could 
scarcely have been overlooked ; but the name of 
Edwin's Burgh, or, as called by the contemporary 
Britons, Dun-Edin, clearly points out the fact, 
that the Saxons under Edwin gave name, and also 
consideration, strength, and jjower, to this place. 

Their seaxes opened a way for them westward ; 
and they warred inveterately with the natives, 
whom they had for the most part cooped up in 
the wildernesses of Reged and Galloway, and he-* 
sitated not to pass the Catrail, a remarkable trench 
running north and south through those parts as 
a boundary, .and in some sort resembling the Dyke 
ef Offa, constructed to separate Mercia from Wales. 
Contemporary with Alfred of England, reigned 
Gregory, surnamed the Great, over the turbulent 
vassals of the 'Lowlands. He fought hard against 
the Danes, and, in return, the Danes fought hard 
against him ; but it is rational to conclude that 
he, nevertheless, fought the hardest, and for this 
reason, to wit, — he conquered them, and put a 
multitude to the sword. 

He then turned his seaxes against the Cum- 
brians, who, being mostly Picts, were at that 
actual time in alliance with his foes. He over- 
came them, and they promised never to be so 
naughty again: but Constantine the Pendragon 


54 WARS BETWEEN THE 

o 

soon forgot his promise, and dared to invade 
Annandale. Gregory followed him — came up 
with him at Lochmaben near Sprthgfield-— fought 
with him — and slew him there by the margins 
of the four lakes. 

* 

To these invaders the Lowlanders probably owe 
the Scoto-Saxon language as existing amongst them 
since that period. 

It is remarkable, observes Sir; Walter Scott, 
that -the obscure contests of the Britons and 
Saxons yet survive in traditional song. For this 
we have to thank the institution of the Bards, the 
second rank of the Druids, and partaking of their 
sacred character. 

This order survived the fall of Druidism, and 
continued to perpetuate whilst it exaggerated th* 
praises of the British chieftains, who continued to 
fight in defence of the Cumbrian kingdom of 
Reged, and the more northern district of Strath- 
Clwyde. 

The chief of these Bards, of whom we still pos- 
sess the lays in the ancient British language, are 
Taliessin, Merlin of Caledonia, Aneurin, and 
Llywarch Hen. The two last appear to have 
been princes ; and, contrary to the original rules 
of their order, they, as well m as Merlin, were 
warriors. 

Urien of Reged, the shores of whose kingdom 
were washed by the waters of the Solway and the 


BRITONS, DANES, AND SAXONS. 55 

Sark, and bis son Owain, of whom we have made 
mention, were much-loved matter of song ; and 
Llywarch Hen had the advantage of witnessing 
the valorous deeds achieved in the morning by 
the light of the sun, which at evening he chaunted 
by the light of lamps and torches. 

These native princes, however, do certainly ap- 
pear to have maintained a long struggle with # the 
Saxons, which was frequently successful, and might 
have been eventually so, had not the refnains of 
the provincial Britons been divided into two petty 
kingdoms, of Cumbria and Strath-Clwyde, and 
those tribes of warriors frequently distracted by 
disunion among themselves. As it was, they 
finally lost their independence ; for no kingdom, 
any more thaft a house, can stand wbgn it is divided 
against itself. 

The last king of the Cumbrian Britons, called 
Dunmail, was slain in a contest nigh unto Amble- 
side, on the waters of Winandermere, where a 
hugeous cairn or barrow, raised ad ejus et rti 
memoriam, is still called Dunmail-Raise ; and his 
country was ceded to Scotland by the conqueror 
Edward, in 945. 

Strath-Clwyde, sometimes resisting and some- 
times submitting, maintained a precarious inde- 
pendence until about 975, when Dunwallon, the 
Hist independent monarch of the northern Britons, 
was defeated by Kenneth III.,' King of the Scots, 


56 WARS BETWEEN THE 

and is said to have buried himself, his mishaps 
and his shamQ, within the privity of a cloister's 
walls. 

Upon the death of Alfred, the succession de- 
volved upon his son Edward, ycleped the Elder, 
and upon Ethelwald his first cousin. Divers un- 
cousinly contentions ensued betwixt these relations 
as to who should finally enjoy the sovereignty ; 
and, had not death arrested Ethelwald in the midst 
of his career, widows and orphans would have 
abounded in England. 

Edward now entered upon the dominion of the 
greater part of the island, with the reservation 
of certain lesser governments appertaining to his 
sister, Ethelfleda, " the Lady of Mercia." This 
heroine was the Boadicea — the Semiramis — the 
Zenobia of that day : she ruled with penetration 
and sagacity, and she acted with promptitude and 
effect. Victory followed her steps, and power 
supported her throne. But she died. She left 
her kingdom— or rather queendom — to Ker daugh- 
ter Elf wina ; for the Salique law had no part 
with the Saxons, but the authority was allowed 
to "fall by the spindle side," that is, through 
the female line. 

After a while some misunderstanding arose, and 
Elfwina was captured by her uncle Edward : he 
conducted her into Mercia, and from that time w» 
get no tidings of her. Peradventure there was 
foul play. 


BRITONS, DANES, AND SAXONS. 57 

Edward's territories were now still farther ex- 
tended, and his puissance became irresistible. He 
overcame many fierce Holdas of the Danes, who 
had been teasing him for a course of years with 
invasion, herriment, and plunder ; he fortified cer- 
tain burgs of his kingdom, that he might strengthen 
himself and terrify his foes ; and he secured the 
affections, or at all events the fears or wills of his 
people, by crafty policy and prudent Adminis- 
tration. 

Such was the dread in which he was held, that 
princes who would gladly have driven their chariot- 
wheels over his neck, if so be they could, fulsomely 
canfe forward with flattery, and craved his alliance. 
By alliance, howbeit, Edward understood sub- 
mission. To submission, moreover, were they 
obliged to stoop ; his strongholds, his comparative 
wealth, and his forces in the field, compelled 
them to it, whatever their preference might have 
been. • 

Within the closure of the " timbered," or 
palisaded, burg of Witham in Essex did the 
people flock to tender their allegiance. The towns 
of Northampton and Bedford followed the ex- 
ample ; and then, with many wry mouths, came 
Colchester and Maiden. After that, all the Dan- 
sker Holdas of the eastern possessions submitted in 
the same way, as a course not easily to be es- 
chewed. Mercia was equally obedient, that had 

d 5 


58 WARS BETWEEN THE 

some time been hostile; Ethelfleda's subjects 
"turned to him" and acknowledged him their 
sovereign, besides certain of the kingdoms of the 
Heptarchy. 

These successes superinduced others. All the 
kings of the Britons— Howel Dda, Cledauc, Ed- 
wall, — became Edward's liege men, and rendered 
him homage, together with their vassals. North 
of the flumber it was just the same ; the Danes 
and the Angles swore fealty, never to serve any 
other prince but only him. 

Last of all, let us turn t6 the theme of our his* 
tory : the men of Gretna Green, in the district of 
Reged, in the British kingdom of Strath-Clwyde, 
accepted him as their " Father, Lord, and Pro- 
tector ;*• and the princes of Galloway, of Cumbria, 
and the King of the Scots, along with all their 
people, threw up their caps and cried " Long life 
to Edward ! " 

About the year 925, after a brilliarit reign, Ed- 
ward fought his last battle: he wrestled with 
death, and was thrown. Athelstane, his son, suc- 
ceeded to the globe and sceptre. 
. Albeit the Britons had acknowledged the fwo 
former Saxon kings -their sovereign lords, they 
now, in this reign, tried to regain their inde-' 
pendence ; and to that end they arose to assert 
their ancient rights. But Athelstane arose too. 
The end of this rising, was, that one side or the 


BRITONS, I)ANE*I> AUb SAXONS. 59 

other must be pit dbwn. Verily the seax, which 
the Teutons had imported ajong with themselves 
ftoto the shores of the Baltic, soon persuaded thfe 
Kelts to give in ; furthermore, they were neces- 
sitated to pay a yearly tribute of much precious 
metal into the " hoard," or treasury, of the King 
of London. All the Cymri of the north — and 
the vellum chronicles especially make mention of 
those who dwelt by the waters of the Solway — 
were compelled into submission to the domination 
of, this fair-haired interloper, besides succumbing 
to the vice-regency of his various Jarls and Heah- 
Gerefas. 

In process of time the Gothic languages began 
to spread themselves over the kingricks of Va- 
lencia ; the Scots and.Picts, amalgamated into one 
people, assuming the former name: but we are 
told that Reged, for many lunar cycles, maintained 
its original Kimbric purity unmixed or sophisti- 
cated, and that this purity, in the remote regions 
of Galloway, was still more marked and more en- 
during. This is not so much matter of marvel' 
when we recollect that in Wales, to which nook 
of the ancient British nation Urien of Reged was 
enforced to slink away from hid* ravishers, the 
language there had survived through all vicissitudes 
in prevalence and purity for nearly a thousand 
years. As it was in Wales, so it was in Gal- 


60 WARS BETWEEN THE BRITONS, ETC. 

loway,— the aborigines were driven westward, 
even until the breakers of the Atlantic dashed 
over their ankles : here they made a stand ; and 
the last traces of their identity are not obliterated 
yet. 


DOWNFALL OF THE SAXONS. 61 


CHAPTER V. 

Downfall of the Saxons, and establishment of the Norman 
ascendancy. — Battle between the English and Scoto-Saxons. 


A chronicle of matters done, 

Which toil and trouble cost ; 
The records of a battle won, 

And eke a battle lost. 

Albeit the Pendragon of Albin had been 
brought to do homage to the Basileus and Bret- 
walda of the South country for the provinces of 
Lothian and the Merse, a counterpoise, by way 
of generous gag, was given him in the districts 
round about the Debateable Land and Carlisle in 
Cumberland, ceded to Malcolm I. The south- 
western frontier of Scotland was very much ex- 
tended beyond the Wall of Severus; whilst the 
eastern boundary was contracted so far north as 
the waters of the Scots* Sea, otherwise called the 
Firth of Forth. That the English monarch 
should have been so generous to his brother, in 
thus yielding up Cumberland, may appear strange 


62 DOWNFALL OF THE SAXONS. 

at first sight, especially when we remember that 
in those lawless daps men battened, not npon 
honest labour, but rather upon plunder ; but, if 
we .may credit historiographers who. have noted 
this transfer, it should seem that the liberal donor 
made a virtue of necessity, since he magnani- 
mously bestowed on his neighbour that which he 
could not well keep unto himself. 

The cause of the cession is obvious, says Sir 
Walter Scott. In exemplification of this he re- 
marks, that the people of Cumberland were of the 
same race and manners with those of the Britons 
of Strath-Clwyde who occupied the opposite fron- 
tier; and Edmund, whd retained but a doubtful 
sovereignty over Northumberland, would have 
been still more embarrassed by the necessity of 
retaining, by garrisons or otherwise, so wild and 
mountainous a country as British Reged. 

By yielding it to Malcolm, he secured a power- 
ful ally, capable of protecting the western frontier 
of Northumberland, and to whose domination the 
Cumbrians might be the more readily disposed to 
submit, as it united them with their brethren of 
Strath-Clwyde. 

With the uncivil wars between Duncan I. who 
came to the throne in 1084, and Macbeth, Mac- 
duff, and certain others, we have nothing to do, 
as the arena of their broils did not lie nigh the 
waters o? the Solway, — the subject of our dis- 


NORMAN ASCENDANCY. 63 

quisitions. Pity it is that they had not occasion 
to come into these pleasant parts, and inhale the 
amorous breezes that ever blew over them ; as, if 
they had, it is possible that the' balmy influence 
of this atmosphere would have suddenly changed 
the tenor of their bosoms, and have set them hug- 
ging, kissing, and caressing each other, quite as 
hard as they had been before fighting. 

William of Normandy, some time aftei*the vic- 
tory of Hastings, pressed his conquests northward 
on the island, and wrenched from Malcolm Cean- 
More, or Great Head, all that part of the western 
border which had, a few years before, been given 
up, as we have remarked. 

William was the most formidable adversary 
that any Scotch king had ever, up to this time, 
had to contend with; for he not only may be 
considered as possessed of a* greater degree of 
civilization than these rude northerners, and better 
skilled in the regular discipline of troops, but he 
had the force of Normandy, as well as the force 
of England, at his command. 

Malcolm's great head, howbeit, was not empty 
pf brains; and by the help of these brains he 
planned and pr6secuted a most vigorous invasion 
into England, as a set-off against William. 

The English king had been sorely tyrannizing 
over his new subjects, so that in Northumberland 
he found them rather disposed to favour his antago- 


64 DOWNFALL OF THE SAXONS. 

nist than himself. With this county he was 
obliged to purchase the allegiance of Gospatric, 
on condition that the said Gospatric should assist 
him against the Scots. This was agreed to/ and 
Cumberland was ravaged accordingly. 

In 1071, William was summoned to quell an 
insurrection in Wales ; %nd, whilst busied' cutting 
men's throats there, Malcolm took the opportunity 
of minciag William's ••people on the borders, not- 
* withstanding that the chroniclers say he did not 
mince the matter at all. 

Malcolm marched, his men through JGretna 
Green, and a wonder it was the amorous atmo- 
sphere did not soften his heart — it is supposed he 
held his breath all the time, and would not inhale 
it. He crossed the Sark and the Debateable Land ; 
he pressed onward with vast expediency and haste, 
using infinite cruelty wherever he came, and, at a 
place ycleped Hundreds-keld, he massacred divers 
English noblemen and all their company. He then 
"veered hys mayne sheete," as Spencer saith, and 
steered away into Yorkshire : here he slew, plun- 
dered, and enslaved ; despatching his booty away 
into Scotland as he took it. When this was done, 
he marched upon Durham : he pillaged the bishopric, 
and burnt ifre sacred edifices to the ground. 

But Gospatric was again in motion. Whilst 
the great-headed king was doing these evil deeds 
near the Eastern seas, Gospatric, on the part of 


NORMAN ASCENDANCY. 65 

William, hied away towards Carlisle to rifle all the 
i regions adjacent : this he did to admiration, until 

Malcolm followed 'him, burning with wrath, and 
swearing that the laws of the land should be put 
in full force against this enemy. 

■ 

And, verily, the established, law of that day was 
put in full force against him, — to wit, the lex 
talionisy or Law of Tit-for-Tat ; for the Scotch king 
came up with him and debated fierce battle with 
him, using swords and spears rather than words, — 
an argument so sharp, as soon talked down Gos- 
patric, and obliged him to fly away hastily. 

Malcolm then returned ii* triumph over the 
border, and espoused^the Saxon princess Margaret, 
a lady famed for every virtue. 

Very little difference has existed since Stephens 
reign with respect to 'the position of the border 
line, if we always except the Debateable Land, 
which was continually a matter of dispute. .Car- 
lisle, which naturally pointed out the western 
extremity of the line, owing to its being the 
principal stronghold m the vicinage, had been care- 
fully repaired by William before his death, as. it 
had continued in a state of dilapidation ever since 
the Danes had pillaged it, two -hundred years 
previously. This act gave great offence to Mal- 
colm Cean-More, since he thought that, as it lay 
within the limits of his feudal dominions, it was a 
breach of the late treaty, and an intrusion which 


66 ASCENDANCY OF 

he had no right to make. Hie fief, or feud, for 
which he did homage, he looked Upon in the same 
light in which a modern tenant looks upon his 
land for which he pays rent to his landlord; to 
wit, that, as long as he pays his rent, (or did 
homage, which was only another way of paying it,) 
that land, or territory, or fief, was his own,— -even 
free from the domination or interference of the 
superior. When William, therefore, came to 
Carlisle, and strengthened it with massy walls and 
towers, the Scottish monarch was perplexed with 
various doubts as to the object of such fortifica- 
tion :• he thought it an undue intrusion, to say the 
least of it ; and he did not at fcll relish the restraint 
that a numerous Norman garrison, placed therein, 
imposed upon him. In fine, he did not like to 
have the Conqueror of England and his soldiers so 
near to him. 

Being a little whit techy at the proceeding, he 
hastened southward to Gloucester, where William 
then held his court, in order to make confplaint in 
person : but the haughty Soft of Rollo would not 
admit him entrance, unless he should, on this 
present occasion, now go through Jhe humiliating 
ceremony of swearing fealty. Malcolm, perad- 
venture fearful of treachery, being so far from his 
own kingdom, refused; but he said he would do 
homage as had ever been the custom heretofore, 
that is, on the borders. As thife was not agreed 


THE NORMANS. 67 

to, Malcolm returned to Scotland and prepared for 
war. 

Carlisle was consequently left in statu quo; 
which, being rendered into the vulgar tongue, 
signifieth, with a Norman garrison in it. 

Stephen found matters in this state, and the 
frontier line terminating at this point. 

Whilst these matters were in debate, other things 
of importance were in progression. Substantial 
changes had taken place, both in the interior of 
South and North Britain, and had amalgamated 
these two grand divisions of the island, each into 
one "great kingdom ; so that* the regions where they 
had hitherto bordered on each other, ceasing to be 
the residence of independent or tributary states, as- 
sumed the character of frontiers, or, as we now 
term them, says Sir Walter Scott, of borders. 

William was prodigal in gifts of territory to 
his barons and lesser chivalry, that shared the 
hazardry of Hastings 9 fight along with him ; and 
several of his followers had grants of land along 
the line' of which we speak. Some ancient minstrel 
has sung this sequent couplet of him, when dis- 
coursing of his large gifts of honour and estate : 

" Dona diastels, dona titez, 
Dona terres as vavarssors." 

This notable fact of the consolidation of .Eng- 
land and Scotland, each into one separate monarchy, 
and wholly unfettered as regarded the other, took 


68 ASCENDANCY OF 

place nearly about the same time. At least, 
albeit the consolidation of England, as a kingdom, 
was achieved somewhat earlier than the settlement 
of Scotland, when the Heptarchy states were all 
united under one diadem, still the distractions, occa- 
sioned by Danish invasions and civil wars, prevent- 
ed her extending herempire over her northern neigh- 
bours. Indeed, the power of England could scarce 
be said to be wielded by one sovereign with uncon- 
trolled sway until William* the Conqueror had 
repressed the various insurrections of the Saxons ; 
subjugated for ever the tumultuary Northumbrians, 
who, for several centuries, had been the n<5ted 
disturbers of that district; and had acquired a 
consolidated force capable of menacing the king- 
dom of Scotland. Had such an event befallen a 
century earlier, it is probable that all Britain, 
would, at that remote era, have been compelled 
by one single sceptre. On the other hand, if per- 
adventure a Scottish monarch had existed during 
the Heptarchy as puissant and as capable of great 
works as Canmore in aftertimes, it is fair to say 
that he, most likely, would have pushed his con- 
quests much further south than- the present borders, 
and would have possibly secured to Scotland all 
the countries north of the H umber. 

Fa$e, however, had so balanced the power, by 
making two equally astute kings contemporaneous, 
and equalities were so balanced between them, 


THE NORMANS. 69 

that curiosity in neither could make choice of 
either's moiety, — a state of affairs that served to 
settle the boundary, even where it has almost in- 
variably ever since remained. 

The orb of Saxon ascendancy now set, never to 
reappear; whilst the sun of Norman dominion arose. 
. Except the massy ecclesiastical edifices of the 
Heptarchy, few traces of the architecture of that 
period remain on the border. The Saxon houses, 
even of the princes, were for the most part built- 
of wood; and their military system consisted 
rather in giving battle in the open field, than in 
attacking or defending places of strength. -They 
may have surrounded their towns with a rude 
circumvallation of earth, or such material as the 
spot afforded ; but they had no turreted castles 
on the border like those which arose so numerous- 
ly soon after, and especially in the reign of 
Stephen, and perhaps none elsewhere. Conings- 
burg Castle, near Sheffield, is, by some antiquaries, 
supposed to be of Saxon origin, and. even, as is 
further* asserted, built on the site of the tumulus 
of Hengist. 

Coins, cups, and drinking-horns, of Saxon and 
Danish manufacture, have from time to time been 
dug up on the frontiers, but the occasions were rare. 

Up to the conquest of England by the Duke of 
Normandy's ill-gotten, son, and for a long time 
subsequently, the border feuds, which raged so 


70 BAJTLE BETWEEN 

fiercely afterwards, can scarcely be said to have 
arisen. It was enough for the monarchs on both 
sides of the line to busy themselves in consoli- 
dating their own authority over so many various 
tribes, as Britons, Saxons, Danes, and Normans, 
without turning their attentions to the annoyance 
of each other, unless when such annoyance tended 
to the end in view. During this early period, 
therefore, the edifices of devotion, as churches, 
•monasteries, and the like, arose the more fre- 
quently, that the good understanding between the 
two countries was only interrupted by occasional 
and brief wars, bearing little the character of in- 
veterate hostility, such as subsequently existed 
between them, even in the piping time of peace. 

The subjects that peopled the Scottish side of 
the frontier. were as heterogeneous in extraction 
as those on the opposite side, and • quite as im- 
patient of control. The Scots and Picts had ever 
been picking quarrels with each other ; but now, 
at the time of which we speak, videlicet, towards 
the close of the eleventh century, they had .melted 
down into one people, bearing the former name. 
The Scoto- Britons of Reged, around the margin 
of the Firth of Solway, struggled hard for in- 
dependence, which' although they lost, they still 
retained their individuality. This was more the 
case with the people of .Galloway, who, lying 
more remote from the authority of the kings* of 


THE ENGLISH AND SCOTO-SAXONS. 71 

Scotland, gave them apparently no m<tfe obedience 
than that which was formerly yielded by the 
British tribes to .the Pendragon. 

In his Essay on Border Antiquities, to which 
we are much indebted, Sir Walter Scott tells us 
that the northern division of Bernicia, extending 
over towards the confines of the kingdom of 
Strath-Clwyde, was inhabited by a numerous 
population of Scoto-Saxons ; being the descend- 
ants of those tribes that had partly colonized the 
district, and partly had fled out of Northumber- 
land to eschew the ravages, first of the Danes, 
and secondly of the Franks. 

Thus, it will be seen, that both the king of the 
north country, as well as the king of the south 
country, were possessed of a heterogeneous com- 
minglement of blood amongst their subjects, that 
but ill-consorted with peace; order, or unanimity. 

Now, about this time a "savage fight between 
the two kingdoms was debated. David, the then' 
king of the north, took part with the Empress 
Maude, his niece, against the pretensions of Ste- 
phen. He had already chastised Stephen at Rox- 
burgh, forcing him to hie away off the field as 
one Who did not prosper in the* strife ; but now, 
the year after, he entered England with a power- 
ful army, and met his foes, who nevertheless 
were much more powerful than he, at a place* 
ycleped Cultqn Moor. His army was composed 


72 BATTLE BETWEEN 

of the inhabitants of Galloway near the western 
frontiers, placed in the van, along with the men 
of Carrie, Kyle, Cunningham, and Renfrew; in 
the second line came the Lodeneses, or dwellers 
in Lothian ; then the irregularly disciplined clans 
from the mountains, commanded* by their own 
maormors or chiefs, who would fight like bull-dogs 
for booty, which, when obtained, they were im- 
patient to carry immediately home. 

The front line of the English army was inter- 
mixed with archers ; and the horsemen, saving, a 
body of cavalry as a reserve at some distance, 
dismounted down from their steeds, that they 
might shun the long lances which the first line 
of the Scots bore. The English had with them 
their most famous standard, wherein they placed 
an infinitude of faith' and confidence as a certain 
palladium against the puissance of their foes. 
They looked upon it much in the same light in 
which most ancient, and, to say the truth, bar- 
barous or superstitious nations, looked upon their 
standards; which, through the cunning of their 
chiefs, were generally declared to have been the 
gift of heaven, or else blessed in some peculiar 
way, so as to render them magfcal and invincible. 
Thus, the Romans found the early Caledonians 
fighting under an ensign of war called the Sun- 
•Beam, which had been transmitted to them by 
Fyn Mac Cowl ;• — and the Romans themselves 


TH£ ENGLISH AND SCOTO-SAXONS. 73 

looked with a supernatural reverence upon the 
legionary eagle : the Lochlyns and Danskers rear- 
ed up a banner emblazoned with a hugeous raven, 
the name of which was Reaftn: the Saxons, under 
Hengist, carried the white horse ; perhaps in com- 
pliment to their leader, whose name means stal- 
lion : and the men of Wessez carried a golden 
dragon before them. 

The English standard, to which we refer, was 
a ponderous and unwieldy machine : the body of 
it was a kind of box mounted upon wheels, so as 
to render* it locomotive ; and from the centre of 
this box was reared the lofty mast of a ship, sur- 
mounted by a glittering silver cross ; and around 
this last were displayed, fluttering in the breezes, 
the gorgeous banners of St. Peter, St. John de 
Beverly, and St. Wilfred. Conspicuous rallying 
points, such as this served for, were in use. all 
over the Continent of Europe about the eleventh 
century. 

If such an apparatus would make men fight, 
why, let them use it, and the desire of their com- 
manders and of their country is fulfilled. He who 
infused his soldiers with a superstitious pride, in 
tutoring them to defend this machine against their 
foes, (and consequently, if not ostensibly, to de- 
fend themselves at the same time,) instilled a 
hyper-natural strength into their arms, and a 
hyper-ordinary courage into their hearts ; and 

yoL. I. E 


74 BATTLE BETWEEN 

thus, by such a practice, victories followed. But, 
take away all the mysticism from the box upon 
wheels, the mast, and the flags, and then, for all 
the good it would . do the army, it might as well 
have been put into the fire. 

Men do not know their real powers until they 
have occasion to put them forth in critical posi- 
tions ; and the plan adopted in the dark ages (and 
it will even succeed in the enlightened ones) was to 
work upon the powers of their pseudo-faith, name- 
ly, their superstition. The pride of preserving their 
badge unviolated, and the idea of shame attached 
to' any injury which might befell it alighting on 
themselves in condemnation, braced them with 
new nerves, and inspirited them with energies 
scarcely their own. 

But the battle began, and the onslaught was 
fierce* The English rushed upon the van of the 
Scots ; and so vigorous was the charge, that the 
latter were enforced to give ground. They were 
unwittingly driven back upon the centre, where 
David commanded in proprii perscnd very im- 
properly — improperly, because his commands, as 
issued to his men, failed in making them obey 
as he directed, that is, in cutting his enemies to 
bits. In fine, they disobeyed his orders: he told 
them to gain him the victory, but they did not. 
Seeing confusion spread amongst the ranks, seeing 
the cool discipline, of his army broken in upon, 


THE ENGLISH AND SCOTO-SAXONS. 75 

and seeing the front line falling back upon 
him as the Southrons advanced, he found it 
expedient to see what was next to be done. 
Haying seen into this, without looking far so 
to do, and being resolved that to contend any 
longer would be but false valour, he decided upon 
embracing that truest part of valour designated 
discretion. His doughty son had hit hard with 
his metal brand all who were not for him; and, 
he himself had vehemently insisted that his sol- 
diers should conquer or — give in. This was all 
vanity in the commencement of the action, and 
vexation of spirit attended on the end. 

living up the day for lost, he turned about 
his horse's head, and hastily retreated, with part 
of his shattered forces, towards Carlisle city, 
where he immured himself peevishly within the 
walls of the castelet. 

Historiographers write that he lost ten thousand 
men on this occasion ; but this is doubted by some 
readers, as it is known that the English did not 
think they had done so much as to instigate them 
to pursuit, and we furthermore find that the 
Scots were able to renew the war next year. 
Howbeit, not logg after, a peace was concluded 
betwixt the two kingdoms; and Prince Henry, 
the same who had hit all opposers so hard with 
his metal brand during the late battle, was en- 
feoffed with Huntingdon and Northumberland, 

B 2 


76 


DEFEAT OF THE SCOTS. 


on condition that he should do service to Stephen 
for them. 

David continued the friend of his niece, the 
Lady Empress Maude, even so long as his spirit 
continued to inhabit his earthly clay ; but, after 
he had reigned more than twenty-nine years, the 
said spirit bid him adieu at Carlisle, and went 
aloft. 


i 


STATE OF SCOTLAND. 77 


CHAPTER VI. 


State of Scotland at the death of Alexander III.— Voyage of 
Sir Patric Spens.— Competitors for the Crown of Scotland, — 
Siege of Carlisle.-— Heroism of the Women in the Castle. 


» 
Here may ye read of deeds begun, 

And by great men achiev'd : 

And glorious things by women done, 

Full hard to be belie vM. 


Neveb were the prospects of any country in 
so deplorable a condition as those of Scotland on 
the unlooked-for death of Alexander III. in 1285. 

This king had married, not at Gretna, the 
sister of Edward I. of England, and probably 
inherited, after a period of nearly eight hundred 
years, and through a long succession of males, 
the sceptres of all the Scottish princes that had 
governed the nation since its first establishment 
in the island. 

He left no sons to succeed him in the kingdom ; 
and his only daughter, Margaret, was the wife of 
Eric, King of Norway. These two had a daugh- 


78 STATE OF SCOTLAND 

ter, also called Margaret ; and this grandchild of 
Alexander now became sole heir to his crown. 

Albeit a female, a foreigner, and an infant, 
still, owing to the wise and precautionary measures 
of her grandfather in settling the succession, she 
had been duly recognized by the states ; so that, 
when his demise became known, no rebellious 
disorders ensued, as might have been expected, 
and as was ordinarily the case. She was uni- 
versally confessed to be the rightful Queen of 
Scotland ; and six noblemen peaceably entered 
upon the administration of affairs, pendente ejus 
ingressu. Eric her father, and Edward her 
great-uncle, also interested themselves in her 
favour, whereby she seemed firmly and happily 
seated upon the Coronation Stone ere she had 
crossed the seas to her new kingdom. 

The ambition of the English monarch led him 
to negotiate a marriage between this youthful 
" Maid of Norway," as she was termed, and 
his eldest son, Edward Prince of Wales; and 
as the animosities which in after-times raged so 
bitterly between the two countries had not then 
arisen, but, on the contrary, as a friendly under- 
standing subsisted between them, the design of 
uniting the whole island under one sovereignty 
was eagerly embraced by all parties; the Scotch 
even agreeing that Margaret should be educated 
at the court of Edward. 


AT THE DEATH OF ALEXANDER III. 79 

The two nations inter-transacted thepe matters 
on the most perfect footing of equality : numerous 
items of agreement were proposed and granted 
on both sides: a long list of articles, touching 
the privileges of Scotland, was made out without 
difficulty or objection : %nd Edward stipulated 
to forfeit 100,000 merks to his holiness the pope 
for the prosecution of the crusades, in case he 
should not abide by the parchment. 

When, after some delay, owing to sending 
several times to Norway, everything had been 
arranged to satisfaction, and Sir Patric Spens 
had sailed for the joyful purpose of fetching the 
infant queen, the astounding intelligence arrived 
that she had died somewhat suddenly. 

Never did such a piteous stroke, fall upon a 
nation since the world was inhabited by the race 
of Adam, and Nimrod founded the first monarchy. 

We owe very little to Scottish history, for the 
particulars of the grievous voyage of Sir Patric 
Spens, but rather derive our knowledge from the 
more authentic source of an unerring tradition, and, 
as we have said before, we uniformly contend 
that tradition is ever the truest part of history. 
" I find no traces of the disaster in Scottish 
history ," observes Sir Walter of Abbotsford ; "but, 
when we consider the meagre materials .whence 
Scottish history, is drawn, this is no conclusive 
argument against the truth of the tradition." 


80 VOYAGE OF 

To this opinion we must all readily agree, and 
consider the grand (though rude) metrical romance 
detailing the expedition as a connecting link in 
the historical chain of those times. 

Sir Patric put to sea on the Monday morning, 
albeit the season of th£ year was so tempestuous 
as to create no small misgivings in the sailor hearts 
of those who went with him. Such was the terror 
entertained for navigating the north seas in winter, 
owing to the frequent disasters that befel in that 
early condition of shipbuilding, and science in 
nautical affairs, that the parliament enacted, in the 
reign .of James III., that no ship should be 
fraughted out of the kingdom, with any staple 
goods, betwixt the feast of St. Simon's day and 
Jude, and Candlemas. 

However, " to Noroway o^er the foam " w&a 
their embassage ; and " be it wind, be it wet, be 
it hail, be it sleet," away they must go to fetch the 
king of Noroway's daughter. 

They hoisted their swelling sails on the Monday 
morning, as we said ; and it should appear that 
they had a fair, though boisterous, passage, for 
.they had crossed the German Ocean and reached 
their destination by the Wednesday. 

They had not been in port a week, when the 
^Norwegian borons began to get impatient of their 
stay; wherefore they commenced an unamiable 
course of annoyance on them, by taxing them with 


SIR PATRIC SPENS. 81 

spending Eric's cash,* and consuming the substance 
of Margaret's fee, by their requisites there in 
banquets and good harbourage on shore. 

This charge they indignantly repelled in un- 
gentle terms, such as, " Ye lie, ye lie, ye liars 
loud ! " But they adduced a better argument than 
abuse ; for they declared that, so far from consum- 
ing the riches of the country, they had brought 
oyer in the ship with them as much white money 
as would suffice for the needments of them all, as 
also the eighth part of a peck of gold. 

Yet, after this inhospitable compliment, they 
felt themselves no longer welcome, but that their 
room would be aj9 acceptable as their company; 
so Sir Patric issued his commands that they 
would sail next morning for Scotland. To do this 
one of his lieutenants was passing loth, from cer- 
tain prognostications of foul weather and pitiful 
luck. " Alack, my dear master," said he, " I fear 
a deadly storm. I saw the new moon, late yes- 
tre'en, with the old moon in her arms ; and, if we 
put to sea, I dread lest evil betide us." 

These forebodings, however, were only laughed 
at as trivial, and were soon overruled or persuaded 
away ; so that every preparation was made, the 
sails let go to the wind, the anchor tilted, the 
hawsers cast off; and the queen being on board, 
together with a courtly assemblage of nobles, they 
all left the port, and stood out to sea. 

B 6 


82 TOT AGE OF • 

Now prepare thine eyes to weep ! -for the hope 
of three nations upon the yest y brine in swaddling-- 
clothes is to be engulfed till she sinks to the sandy 
bottom, there to be made— food for crabs. 

They had barely made a good offing from the 
land, when the sky grew heavy and dark, the 
wind became gusty and freshening into a gale, and 
the sea began to ran fearfully high ; the anchors 
were hit away from the ship's bows, the topmasts 
were sprung by the violence of her pitching over a 
head-swell, and every wave that struck her for- 
ward swept her decks from one end to the other. 

The man at the wheel (or simple helm, perad- 
venture,) gave his place up ta an able seaman, 
whilst he went aloft to try and get a sight of land ; 
but the. change had scarcely been made, when she 
was struck so severely, owing, like enough, to the 
helmsman letting her fall off a point from the wind, 
that her timbers shivered throughout her whole 
length, and a bolt, or plank (for it is not quite 
certain), started from her side, so that the water 
rushed into her like a flood. 

In this emergency they resorted to a plan which 
is still in usage in like cases of springing a leak, or 
of getting a shot through a ship's side below the 
water-line ; only that, instead of drawing a mat. or 
quilted sail under her bottom and over the spot, 
they were enforced to employ " a web of "silken 
cloth." But every exertion proved unavailing. 


SIR PATRIC SPENS. 83 

The leak gained upon them, and grievous was their 
plight. 

They seem never to have put about and run 
before the wind back for Norway; but to have 
perseveringly held on their way homeward, despite 
a head-wind and head-sea against them. 

We are amusingly told how troubled the Scotch 
lords were that the water should wet their cork- 
heeled shoes; but that,. long ere the tragedy had 
been fully enacted, not only their phoes, but the 
very crowns of their hats likewise, were soaked 
with the gait spray. 

They went down in fifty fathoms" water when 
they had got so near their native country as fifty 
miles off Aberdeen : the ship foundered and went 
to pieces ; the feather-beds of the floating nobility 
(and they were rare articles of luxury in those 
days) danced -about upon the foam ; whilst Sir 
Patric Spens found a resting-place on the pebbles 
and sand, along with his companions in misadven- 
ture, where their bones have become a rich bed of 
white coral. 

Nothing could exceed the bewailment of uni- 
versal Scotland when these woful tidings landed 
upon that coast and journeyed over the face of the 
country; we are assured that the ladies wrung 
their white hands, and tore their black hair, for 
o the loss of their true loves whom they were doomed 
never again to see: but more important effects 


84 COMPETITORS FOR 

■ 

than these so lamentable were about to accrue to 
the kingdom at large, owing to the untimely death 
of Margaret the queen. To these let us turn. . 

This infant princess had been the sole and last 
heir of that King William I. who was taken 
prisoner by Henry II. of England before Alnwick, 
and, therefore, the succession now devolved upon the 
issue of David, Earl of Huntingdon, his brother ; 
whose male line being also extinct, left the succes- 
sion open to the posterity of his daughters. These 
daughters were three; the eldest married Alan, 
Lord of Galloway; the second married Robert 
Bruce, Lord of Annandale ; and the third con- 
descended to Henry, Lord Hastings, an English 
nobleman. The eldest left one daughter,* wedded 
to John Baliol, who, by her, had a son who now 
started up as a competitor for the vacant crown, — 
and it will be seen that he is the heir of the eldest 
branch ; the second had a son (Robert Bruce), also 
a competitor ; and the third had a son, who like- 
wise contended for — anything he could get. 

When this last had been driven from the field, 
Baliol and Bruce strove for the sovereignty : 
the former basing his right on being descended 
of the elder daughter, though he was her 
grandson ; whilst the latter urged his claim 
on being only the son, albeit ' of the second 
daughter, and, as he insisted, one degree nearer to c 
the common stock. 


_J 


^w 


mm 


mm 


■P 


THE CROWN OF SCOTLAND. 


85 


According to modern ideas t)f succession, Baliol 
was the rightful heir, — we holding it that the 
grandson of the oldest branch has priority of claim 
oyer the son of the second. In those days, not- 
withstanding, men's minds were not clearly settled 
and satisfied on this point, and hence. arose two 
powerful factions in Scotland, that lacerated that 
nation from- Gretna to John-o^Groat's House. 

In this dilemma, with the sword of civil war 
hanging over their heads bare and. keen, they 
resolved to refer their perplexities to the arbitra- 
ment of Edward, in the hope that his mediation 
might avert the ruin that threatened them. 

This was just what he wanted. 

Even before the voyage of Sir Patric Spens, 
and the death, of the. Maid of Norway, he seems 
to have been fully prepared for anything that 
might happen; wherefore, when the bishop of 
St; Andrew's and the other deputies presented 
themselves and their troubles before him, he enter- 
ed upon an adjustment of the succession with a 
readiness and confidence truly admirable. 

The opportunity that now opened itself upon 
the English monarch, was too tempting for his 
virtue to withstand : he was like many other men 
of the world — he could resist' any desire so long 
as temptation was out of his way ; but, when 
allured to evil, he fell as most others do. He 
-thought .he had now a chance of renewing, if 


*<r 


86 COMPETITORS FOR 

not creating, an ancient claim of feudal superiority 
over the northern half of the island, which some 
of the early kings of England had tried to estab- 
lish ;— a claim which had long lain in utter ob- 
scurity, and which, if it had eyer been an object 
of -attention, or in the least remembered or suspect- 
ed, would have effectually prevented the Scotch 
barons from selecting Edward for their umpire. 

Although this claim to the entire sovereignty, 
which was purposed to bring the whole island 
under one sceptre, was pre-eminently unjust at 
this juncture, it was -one that offered immense 
advantages to his own kingdom, and might indeed 
have tended to the real amelioration of Scotland 
at that distant day : but, without looking into the 
abstract merits of the affair, he had all the old 
monasteries ransacked for fusty chronicles writ by 
his own countrymen ; and any passages therein 
occurring, which might be construed to his ad- 
vantage, he seized upon as proofs of his dominion 
over that kingdom, and as of his being hereditarily 
the superior l\ege lord over its kings, his feudal 
vassals* This was letting in a new light upon the 
Scotchmen. 

Astounded as they now were at the fatal mis- 
take they had made in the choice of an umpire, 
their inability to resist him and cast him of£ 
precluded the possibility of their calling in another, 
or of settling their disputes uninterfered with,— 


THE CROWN OF 8COTLAND. 87 

particularly as Edward was by this time marching 
northwards with a powerfiil iurmy. He established 
himself in the castle of Norham on . the south 
bank of the Tweed, and here he invited all the com- 
petitors and the Scottish parliament to attend him. 

When they had here put themselves into his 
power, he informed them through the mouth of 
his chief justiciary, Roger le Brabanfon, of his 
unquestionable claim to the kingdom, and then 
called upon them to acknowledge and ratify it. 

Their astonishment struck them dumb. 

" Qui tacet, consentire videtur" saith the 

« 

Roman: and, if Edward thought so now, he 
afterwards discovered that, of a truth, they were 
not willing to relinquish their rights, however 
impotent they might be to retain them. 

On a subsequent occasion of the same nature, 
their rage and indignation had a like power of 
sealing their tongues, with the sole exception of 
the tongue of one baron, who rose up and nobly 
said, when they were required. to assent to the 
proposition,—" Until we have a king, we can 
give no answer on so momentous a point." 

But the fact was, their king was among them, — 
or, at all events, their usurper ; and the awe 
inspired by his well-known military fame, their own 
internal dissensions and weakness, and the fact that 
a large army was encamped close to them, terrified 
away every objection, and drove them to an acknow- 
ledgment of their own state of vassalage. Robert 


w^^ 


88 COMPETITORS FOR THE CROWN. 

Brace was the first to confess Edward's superiority, 
and John Baliol the last ; — to say nothing of the 
like confessions from nine other competitors, 
whom we have not thought it relevant to notice. 

He then appointed a number of commissioners, 
still further to examine the* claims, ordering that 
their decisions should be reported to him next 
year ; but that forsooth in the mean time, in order 
to put the true heir in possession of the crown, It 
was necessary that all the fortresses should- be 
delivered up into his hands ! and this monstrous 
demand was complied with, both by the states 
and by the claimants themselves ! He then made 
all the especial barons and prelates swear fealty 
to him before the assembly broke upi and, these 
great matters having been achieved, he marched 
southwards to quell some disturbances there. ' 

Meanwhile the commissioners diligently debated 
the question of succession, as to the respective 
titles of Baliol and Bruce, — a question that was 
likewise given to most of the celebrated lawyers 
of Europe. It was very rightly decided in favour 
of Baliol;* and, on his doing homage to Edward 
for his kingdom, the fortresses were delivered up 
to him, and he was acknowledged king of Scotland. 

Things remaining in this condition for a space, 
it became the usurper's policy to incite J6hn of 
Scotland to rebellion, for the purpose of creating 
to himself an excuse for going to war, merely that 


SIEGE OF CARLISLE* 89 

he might lead an army northward and still fur- 
ther establish his dominion over the devoted coun- 
try : he therefore heaped the most galling indig- 
nities and insults upon his royal vassal, and, in 
£ne, succeeded in bringing about the consumma- 
tion of his unworthy plot. 

Unable any longer tb endure the oppressions of 
Edward, the Scots flew to arms and invaded Cum- 
berland. They directed their march through , 
{Jratney, or Gretna, at the head of the Solway, 
of which territory the Johnstones were possessors 
during the subsequent Border wars, — crossed the 
Debateable Land, — the sands of the Eden, — and 
laid siege to Carlisle. 

The siege is one of the most remarkable in the 
annals of warfare. 

The mighty host that assembled on the plain 
beneath the walls amounted to five hundred 
cavalry, and forty thousand infantry; — and a force 
no greater has heretofore conquered kingdoms. 
To such a degree did the consternation of the 
English rise, when they beheld this puissant army 
marshalled against them, that the men of the city, 
instead of resolutely tarrying to defend their homes 
from the invaders, fled by the south gate farther 
into their own country, leaving the women and 
children behind, to be dealt with even just as it 
might happen, for all they cared. 

It should appear that their retirement was so 


90 HEROISM OF THE WOMEN 

precipitate, that they had little time to take their 
valuables away with them; or, peradventure, if it be 
that they did take away their valuables, the said 
" valuables " did not consist in their wives. That 
the city would be instantly occupied by the Scots, 
was looked on as a matter of course ; but then, as 
the women could make nd resistance, and conse- 
quently were unable to provoke them, they, as 
harmless, innocent, and unoffending creatures, were 
considered by their cowardly husbands as perfectly 
safe from slaughter or vengeance, when the enemy 
should be among them. 

But this very base pusillanimity residing in 
their own bosoms caused them to underrate the 
high virtues in their wives, and to be ignorant of 
the excellent magnanimity that resides in the 
nature of the other sex, when placed in circum- 
stances of misadventure or peril. 

A. gruff voice hoarsely summoned the city to 
surrender and open its gates. Yet, what delicate 
form is that standing upon the battlements ? and 
what lily -fair hand is that, that grasps a glittering 
halberd? and- what sweet-toned voice is that 
which responds to the hoarse speaker? saying 
that, no, forsooth, they could not on any account 
render up the- city to the bare-kneed Scotchmen ; 
— that, indeed, they must be excused;— that, 
albeit the men had fled away, and had betaken 
themselves to safety, still they had left the women 


IN TH£ CASTLE. 9 1 

behind ;— that the women so left behind had not 
made up their minds to open their gates just yet, 
nor did they think they should until their besiegers 
were weary of waiting in the trenches, or sleeping 
©' nights in the castle ditch ; — that they craved 
favour and forgiveness for this want of good 
courtesy towards their new visitants ; — that they 
had come to them so suddenly, that they had 
prepared no banquet fitting such noble guests ;— 
besides, their husbands and brothers being absent, 
they, were diffident of giving wassail entertain- 
ments, as it was not their practice to do so in 
sooth ; — that their voices were not very deep, nor 
much given to the commandment of warriors ;— 
that their arms were not, peradventure, so brawny 
as most asms that wield the long-sword, nor their 
fingers quite so hard as most fingers, that draw 
the arblast-bow ;— but that for the sake of amus- 
ing the Scots, whom indeed they could not on 
this present receive into their banquet-hall, being 
only a company of unprotected women, they were 
content to lay aside the broidering needle and the 
distaff, to forget white-seam and shell-work for a 
space, and to strain their fine sinews with the 
weight of lifting cruel battle-axes, drawing cloth- 
yard arrows, and plying mangonels ; — and lastly, 
that such being their resolution, from which, if 
they knew their own minds, they did not mean 
to swerve, the strangers must not take it amiss, 


92 HEROISM OF THE WOMEN 

or hold them discourteous, if they repeated their 
first answer to the summons, namely, that the 
ladies positively declined opening their gates to 
so numerous a host of honourable gentlemen. — Still 
standing on the battlements, she bid them a hearty 
farewell, at the same time apologizing that her 
throat had grown a little dry, and her voice a 
little husky, by reason of speaking a wee bit 
longer than was her custom to do. 

Ye must not hold it strange, if we say that a 
stentorian roar burst from the helmeted and 
bearded ranks that swarmed upon the plain, the 
moment after this address was ended. Here was 
matter of infinite mirth and divertisement to the 
swarthy warriors. A woman had told them that 
the men had fled away in terror for safety from 
the city; yet, at the same time had told them that 
their wives and maidens had thrown aside their 
needle-work — had refused them entrance — and 
veritably had avowed it their determination to 
defend themselves with cruel weapons made of 
steel, and very heavy to lift, against a mighty 
host of veterans, just issued from their own 
country, fresh, healthful, and strong ! 

Laughing and jesting at the prospect of much 
unlooked-for pleasant pastime, they ascended the 
slopes, and, planting their scaling-ladders against 
the walls, began to mount. 

The event, howbeit, was passing strange. 


IN THE CASTLE. 98 

The highest man on the ladder, so far from 
stepping over the wall, came toppling downward 
upon the pikes of his companions beneath, pierced 
to the heart with some deadly weapon. This was 
not believable, — there must be some mistake. 
Another mounted, — down he came : then ano- 
ther, — and he came headlong also. 

There was something wrong. Let a hundred 
ladders be planted, and let a thousand men hie up 
and investigate the cause of this impediment. 

There was no mistake in the matter. The 
Scots mounted by crowds; but the countless 
spears of the fair besieged thrust them back 
again gasping, and giving out their lives along 
with the ruddy fountains of their hearts' blood. 

The Scotch were more than astonished, — they 
were dismayed. However, they now assaulted 
the fortifications systematically, resolutely, and 
fiercely. The crossbow-men drew their bolts 
at the defenders on the towers, staining with 
crimson many a white skin; a numerous body 
essayed to overtop the works by an impetuous 
escalade; and the Annandale men, with their 
steel-headed double-length spears, tried to clear 
a way for them to reach the battlements. It was 
all in vain : — they were beaten back with the 
most universal slaughter; they were cut down 
wherever they attempted to make a lodgment; 


94 HEROISM OF THE WOMEN. 

and they were minced to pieces with swords, or 
pierced to instant death with arrows or partizans, 
the moment they showed themselves near the 
summit of the walls. 

This, for a long timet, was too ridiculous for 
belief; but when repeated efforts only tended tp 
strew the plain and fill the ditch with their dead 
countrymen, instead of leading on to victory, the 
Scotch looked at each other in wonderment, and 
turned away from the city in despair and shame. 

Fierce indeed was the assault; but brave and 
determined was the defence. The siege was 
raised, and given up as impracticable ; and the 
invaders decamped hastily? and marched eastward 
into Northumberland,' leaving the ladies successful 
defenders of their city.* 

* Perhaps we have employed more words in describing this 
memorable siege than were absolutely necessary : bnt we love 
to do the ladies justice, and must crave indulgence on that 
score. We have not departed from history, since all the old 
writers agree in saying that tire men retired from the city ; — 
that the women successfully defended it with vast courage ;— 
and that the Scotch brought the mighty host, as mentioned 
above, over the Border, and invested it to no purpose, but 
were enforced to raise the siege, and retire in shame. 


i 


DISPUTED SUCCESSION. 95 


CHAPTER VII. 


Battles between the English and the Scotch in the reign of 

Edward the First. 


One king unmakes another : then 

Upstarts a third full quickly : 
The first prepares for warfare, when, 

He dies — being very sickly. 

John Baliol, the king, procured from his holi- 
ness, Pope Celestine,. a dispensation for himself 
and his nation, excusing them from the obligation 
of all their oaths of feudality ; and then, when 
thus freed, he and his adherents formally re- 
nounced all allegiance to Edward of England. 

The Rubicon (the Sark, of course) was now 
passed, and nothing but the clangour of war was 
heard on every side. 

The English monarch led a host northward, 
well-ordered and well-disciplined, and equal in 
numbers to that of the Scots that had been so 
ipemorably driven from Carlisle, and eastward into 


96 BATTLES BETWEEN 

the- shire of Northumberland : he invaded Scot- 
land on the Cheviot side, and, immediately assault- 
ing Berwick both by sea and land, took that town 
by storm, and barbarously put eight thousand 
persons to the sword. Edward then sent Earl 
Warrenne forward with twelve thousand men to 
attempt Dunbar ; and this nobleman, meeting with 
the Scots in the plain, encountered them so fiercely 
and so effectually, that* he drove them before him, 
and brought back a complete victory. The per- 
dition of the vanquished amounted to twenty 
thousand. The falls of Roxborough, Edinburgh, 
Stirling, and divers other especial strengths, in- 
continently ensued ; so that, in a short space after 
the Southrons had passed the frontier, the whole 
of the Lowlands, stretching out betwixt the Che- 
viots and the Grampians, had been reduced to 

r 

submission. In order to effect the subjugation 
of the Highlands, a strong reinforcement of Irish 
and Welsh, who, from the natures of their own 
native countries, were best fitted to ensue an 
enemy into his wilds, fastnesses, and savage moun- 
tains, was despatched to hunt the kilted Cale- 
donians to defeat and death. This, for many 
reasons, they were able to do: — BaHol himself 
had a meek and irresolute spirit, that suited rather 
to bear a sceptre and diadem, than a jeddart-staff 
and helmet ; so that, when he began to lose heart 
and waver, his adherents very soon began to waver 


THE ENGLISH AND SC6TS. 97 

also, and fall off from him : his people were disunit- 
ed and at variance amongst themselves, broken by 
faction, and estranged by a contrariety of interests ; 
— and, as the house that is divided against itself 
cannot stand, neither can a kingdom so lacerated 
stand either. 

Baliol, in fine, renounced his crown to Edward ; 
and, with much abject submission, protested his 
contrition for having so rebelliously forgot his 
faith to his liege lord. 

The conqueror pressed his victories forward as 
far north as Elgin, meeting with none except 
those who came to cast themselves . at his feet to 
do homage : even the turbulent Highlanders pro- 
mised obedience in the most slavish manner, and 
Scotland was now entirely subdued and reduced 
to an apparent tranquillity. 

It was in returning from this conquest, that 
Edward took the Coronation Stone with him into 
England. The stone itself, fixed in the bottom 
of the chair, of an iron-like or steely colour veined 
with red, is a parallelopiped in figure, measuring 
in inches about 11 x 13 x 22. It is reported to 
have formed the pillow of Jacob, when he fell 
asleep on the plain of Luz, and dreamt his angelic 
vision : it was afterwards taken to Brigantia in 
the kingrick of Gallicia in Spain, and used as a 
seat of justice by Gathelus or Gathol, king of the 
incipient Scotg, coeval with Moses : Simon Brach, 

VOL. i. p 


98 BATTLES BETWEEN 

monarch of the same dynasty, 700 years before 
the Christian era, tyore it with him into Ireland : 
Fergus, about 330 years before Christ, removed 
it to the castle of Dunstaffnage in Lorn : Kennet 
II. took it to Scone in 850 after Christ : and lastly 
there it remained until Edward carried it to West- 
minster in 1396. 

It bears the following inscription : — 

" Ni fallat fatum, Scoti, quocunque locatum 
Invenient lapidem, regnare teneantur ibidem." 

Thus rendered into mother English : — 

" Should fate not fail, where'er this stone is found, 
The Scots shall monarchs of that realm be crown'd." 

And hence it is that the Scotch to this day 
believe themselves to form the principal portion 
of Great Britain, and to enjoy the sovereignty 
over that part ycleped England, because James 
the Sixth — First, on the defunction of Elizabeth, 
came and took possession of England, a kingless 
realm, and England did not go and take possession 
of Scotland. Thus, according to Lion King at 
Arms, the marshalling of the royal achievement 
can scarcely be fair heraldry, so long as the noble 
and rampant beast, girded about by the double 
tressure, is excluded from the first quarter of ihfi 
shield. 

John Baliol was a close prisoner for more than 
two years in the Tower of London ; but, being 
afterwards liberated, he retired to France, where 


THE ENGLISH AND SCOTS. 99 

he remained in seclusion during the remnant of 
his days. 

Patriotic risings of the people, however, soon 
manifested themselves throughout the newly com- 
pelled province ; and the most distinguished cham- 
pion of that period started up in the person of 
Sir William Wallace, with whom, in a short, space 
of time, and after some successes gained, was 
confederated Sir William Douglas* 
* Meanwhile, Edward was making great prepara- 
tions against a descent on France, a measure that 
was not over-agreeable to some of his nobles; 
since the cause, by them, was not looked upon 
as altogether just, especially as they were heavily 
taxed to pander to the arbitrary ambition of their 
restless prince. He had assembled an army which 
he purposed to send over into Gascony under the 
command of Humphrey Bohun, Earl of Hereford ; 
but the haughty peer decidedly objected to the 
measure, and positively refused to go. A violent 
altercation ensued hereon ; and the king, now 
in a towering rage, fiercely cried out to* Hereford, 
— " Sir Earl, by God you shall either go or hang !" 

" By God, Sir King," replied the nobleman, 
"I will neither go nor hang!" Upon this he 
departed, together with about thirty considerable 
barons who were of his way of thinking. The 
invasion was given up, and Scottish affairs de- 
manded attention. 

f2 


100 BATTLES BETWEEN 

Wallace had now been running a brilliant 
career of victory over the English viceroys and 
vicegerents ; and to check this before Scotland 
should regain her liberty, as she was apparently 
doing by rapid strides, the Earl Warrenne was 
commissioned thitherward with forty thousand men. 
He entered the struggling country by the West 
Marches, directly through the field of our most 
particular labours in this authentic work. 

Having crossed the marshy flats of Carlisle*, 
the Moss of Solway, and forded the Sark at the 
head of the Firth, and trod upon ground now 
occupied by the modern Gretna Green, yet without 
giving a thought upon love or matrimony, but 
only upon blood and murder, he pressed onwards 
to Irvine. The Scots prudently retreated before 
him, as their promises of advantage were but 
slender in their present position; and retired as 
far as Stirling, where a battle was fought, and 
where Wallace gained the day. Gressingham, 
one of Warrenne's generals, much hated by the 
adverse party, was slain in this action; and his 
enemies showed their vengeance on his dead body 
by actually making girths and covering saddles 
with his skin, which they fiercely stripped off. 

A series of other martial achievements, happily 
struck in the oppressed province, recalled Edward 
from Flanders, whither he had gone to prosecute 
a war. He collected, saith the Afftttttltt 


THE ENGLISH AND SCOTS. 101 

ftfOttpfcpU, a mighty host one hundred thousand 
strong, culled out of all his dependencies of Eng* 
lqpd, Wales, and Ireland ; and, placing himself 
at the head of this multitude, advanced towards 
the Cheviots. * He soon came up with those he 
sought ; — encountered them, routed them, and 
is reported to have slaughtered no less than sixty 
thousand. 

Wallace retreated in good order along the banks 
of the Carron ; and it was on this stream, on this 
occasion, that he met the young Bruce, who called 
to him and entreated him to submit to the con* 
queror, — =a measure to which the former would by 
no means incline, but, on the contrary, made so 
eloquent and so affecting a reply to the latter, 
that Bruce was immediately converted to the 
cause of 'his country, and, repenting him of his 
submission to Edward, secretly resolved thence- 
forward to strike for freedom. 

The English monarch returned into his own 
country by crossing the Sark and the Debateable 
Land, amusing himself, howbeit, on the way 
through Annandale, by assaulting and reducing 
Bruce's castle of Lochmaben. 

Bruce being in the power of his enemy, and, 

worse still, in his custody, Edward, in order that 

, he might murder his way to the sovereignty of 

Scotland, expressed it as his intention, one night 

when he had been drinking somewhat fretf y with 


102 BATTLES BETWEEN 

his courtiers, that he would put this competitor 
for the crown to death next day; and to this 
step he had been partly instigated by the jealo&is 
advices of John Cummin, another heir to the 
Scottish monarchy. * 

The Earl of Gloucester being present, and 
hearing what passed, forthwith sent a messenger 
to his friend in durance, with twelve pence and 
a pair of spurs. Bruce took the hint, and pre- 
pared for flight. 

We are pleasantly informed that he had the 
shoes of his horse put on hind- side before ; so 
that the impressions of them on the snow, which 
then lay on the ground, could be no indication 
to any who might seek him as to his progress 
Scotland-ward. 

He forded the river Eden, not distant far from 
the city, on whose wall the sun shines bright; 
crossed the matrimonial district at the head of 
the Solway, which we desire to celebrate in these 
pages ; and stopped not until he arrived at Loch- 
maben, so lately in the hands of his foe. 

A space. after this he fell at jars and ungentle 
speech with the aforesaid Cummin in the Convent 
of the Minorites at Dumfries, and, in the ungo- 
vernableness of his passion, pierced him deep with 
a steel blade ; yet Lord Hailes held that the deed 
was not the fruit of malice prepense. The per- 
secuted^ kingdom flew to arms, — the friends of 


THE ENGLISH AND SCOTS. 103 

Bruce rallied around him, — he hastened to Scone 
to be. crowned, and the diadem was actually 
placed upon his head by a woman, the Countess 
of Buchan, sister to Macduff, Earl of Fife. 
Edward had now to commence his work all over 
again, for his power north of the border had been 
well-nigh annihilated by these deeds. 

The young and mettlesome king performed many 
a bright chevisance of valour and hardiment ; 
sometimes stricken down by defeat from his 
enemies, and, at others, dealing unto them even 
so much as they gave him. The monarch of 
England, though well advanced in years, was 
still untired and untiring; and, once more de- 
nouncing the Scots as incorrigible, made prepara- 
tion for immense war upon them again, vowing 
that he never would rest until he had punished 
them for their disobedience. He had been sadly 
afflicted with bodily ailments of late, yet was he 
resolved to chastise them in person, for his spirit 
was as active as ever. In traversing his own 
kingdom, and even until he had got so far as 
Carlisle, he had been compelled to journey in 
a palfrey litter ; but here, feeling himself in some 
little sort convalescent, and able to proceed in a 
more martial estate, he solemnly offered up the 
said litter in the cathedral church of the city 
as a gift to heaven. 

When this pious ceremony had been achieved, 


104 BATTLES BETWEEN 

• 

he feebly threw himself upon his horse, and, 
leading his puissant army out through the Scot- 
land gate, directed his course onward towards 
the head of the Solway waters, even over the same 
ground as we have already conducted the reader 
times not a few. Surely ye now know this ground 
passing well — its features — its nature : yet not* 
withstanding that here and* there, in the present 
day, on the great Moss the eye of the peregrtnator 
meets but a cheerless view of black peat and 
barrenness, relieved partially with squalid huts and 
thriftless enclosures; in the troublous reign of 
Edward I., the face of this region was far more 
sad, sandy, and sedgy. The billows of the western 
brine flowed yestily over the flats, whensoever 
the occiduous tempests puffed rudely in the face 
of green nature : the rush, the sword-leaved flag, 
and the rank coltsfoot, overgrew their commission 
in the rancid marshes stretching along the banks 
of the Esk ; and the noxious toad lifted his head 
above the pestiferous pools, and croaked hoarsely 
to the lizard looking out of his hole. 

Edward crawled no more than six miles in four 
days, whereas the lovers of this present era hie 
over the Moss nine miles and a half in the space 
of one hour : but then Edward was not going Jlq 
be married to the lady of his heart's election; 
— no, forsooth, he was only going to conquer a 
kingdom. 


THE ENGLISH AND SCOTS. N 105 

When he had attained so far as to Burghron-the 
Sands, his strength failed him, and he began to 
see that all is vanity and more than vexation — 
that our mightiest transactions are but child's play 
— that we were only born as it were the day before 
yesterday, and surely cannot have completed our 
threescore and ten — r and that the end of life is 
sure to come before we have half finished the 
projects we had in hand, and just as we were on 
the point of setting about the arrangement of 
something new, mightier and better than all the 
rest, so that it is an infinite pity that we should 
die, and not accomplish it. 

It was all nothing : his ailments now came upon 
him so grievously as to be past durance ; where- 
fore, to eschew them, he died. 


r 5 


106 MILITARY ANNALS. 


CHAPTER VIII. 


Military Annals : Bruce arid Baliol. Border Laws. 


Of kings deposed, or made, or dead, 

And what might be the cause ; 
Of Warden Courts where much was said 

Touching the Border Laws. 

The dead bones of Edward I. were not borne 
forward through Gretna into Albin, as he' had 
enjoined with his latest breath ; but his successor, 
of an easy and placable constitution, averse to the 
stern life of a campaigner, and less vigorous than 
his father, gave up the Scottish war, retired south- 
wards, and disbanded his army. 

At this, the young Bruce issued from his 
fastnesses, and commenced a most brilliant career 
of victory. He paid a visit to the capital of Cum- 
berland, by traversing the amorous regions wherein 
our scene is for the most part laid ; and then, veer- 
ing eastward, put a crowning glory upon his fame 
by scattering his foes on the banks of the streamlet 
of Bannockburn. 


BRUCE AND BAL10L. 107 

This amorous region was also trodden under the 
feet of slaughtermen and barbed steeds a space 
after, when the naked-kneed Northerners poured 
through the western marches to carry herriment 
into Lancashire ; and again, ift the following reign 
of Edward JIL, no less than twenty thousand 
cavalry, armed at all points, covered the Moss, and 
the Sands of Burgh, with the prints of iron horse- 
shoes. 

John Baliol, who had been duly enthroned by 
Edward I., and then as duly deposed and put in 
the Tbwer, had a son ycleped Edward, who now 
started up against Bruce,-— or rather his infant 
successor David, — and prepared to carry a species 
of York-and-Lancaster war into Scotland, such as 
in afteaftimes dislocated the frame of .England so 
cruelly. He quitted Normandy, where he had 
dwelt in seclusion since his father's death, and, 
with the aid of certain powerful allies, invaded his 
own country with much success. His claim to 
the crown having lain dormant for some time, and 
Bruce having tyiilt unto himself a stable throne by 
valour and activity, it was not without much 
difficulty that he effected a lodgement in Fife, 
notwithstanding he had vainly flattered himself that 
the offspring of the former acknowledged monarch 
would have been welcomed with friendly zeal. 

Although forty thousand men debated his com- 
ing, he contrived, during the turmoil of a hard 


108 MILITARY ANNALS. 

fight by the river Erne, to use up twelve thousand 
of them — himself only losing thirty men. This 
was "doing the thing" in grand style. Other 
victories, nearly as decisive, followed in succession ; 
so that, in an incredibly short period after his land- 
ing* he brought all Scotland to his feet, and a 
thorough revolution was effected, when his corona- 
tion at Scone speedily took place. 

But there is nothing sure under the sun (with 
few exceptions), not even the retention of a 
diadem; and it was in Annandale, where many 
remarkable things in all ages have befallen, l!hat a 
counter-revolution to his prejudice was effected, 
entirely sapping and subverting the splendid edifice 
that his labours had erected. 
. The youthful Baliol was now king of <his own 
realm ; his fathers claim was confessed by a large 
body of nobles, and they had anointed him their 
liege lord and sovereign head within the walls of 
the royal palace of Scone. The rapidity of his 
elevation had been the unspeakable dismay of his 
foes, the admiration of his friends, and the wonder 
of both. 

But divers pesterous gad-flies of the adverse 
party still buzzed about his ears, and it was ex- 
pedient that these should be beaten down. Sir 
Archibald Douglas, his evil genius and his terror, 
was one of these, and not the least. This noxious 
creature, together with Simon Fraser and William 


BRUCE AND BALIOL. 109 

Lord of Liddesdale above Gretna, had a kind of 
wasp's nest near Annan, and the new king set 
out upon a martial progress thitherward in order 
to destroy it. This matter was commenced in- 
continently ; the clash of weapons was loud, and 
the notches on their edges were hacked so deep 
and so thick, that swords soon became saws : but 
the just do not always prosper in this world, for 
Douglas and his partizans won the day before 
night, and Baliol lost it before sun-down. 

This was a sad reverse ; and so complete was 
the success on one side, and so crushing was 
the defeat on the other, that Baliol, in bodily 
fear of Douglas his foe, hastily took horse, saith 
the legend, " without saddle or bridle," being 
"almost frightened to death ;" and riding, in his 
hurry, "half naked" through the modern parish 
of Gretna and the Debateable Land, he made 
for Carlisle, where he fortified himself, " to shun 
the fiiry of Douglas." 

Thus he lost his throne by as sudden a revolu- 
tion as he had won it, being now destitute of re- 
sources, means, rescues, and friends. But it was 
the policy of Edward to lend him a hand in his 
reverses, and to establish his ascendancy in Scot- 
land, because he would promise to consider this 
monarch his liege lord, as his father had abjectly 
done, and himself only a vassal in his own king- 
dom ; wherefore Edward invested Berwick in Ba- 


110 MILITARY ANNALS. 

Hoi's behalf, and in two months reduced it to 
extremity, so much so, that the governor pro- 
mised to surrender to the English if his own coun- 
trymen did not lend him succours speedily. This 
fact having become known to Douglas the Scotch 
commander, lie hastened to the relief, and drew 
up his forces in battle-array nigh unto Halidon 
Hill ; but Victoria, the bright goddess of success 
and triumph, raised her diadem over England, 
and. prosperity attended her. The tartaned sons 
of the Grampians were driven off with the im- 
mense slaughter of thirty thousand men; whilst 
we are assured that, under the wing of the above- 
mentioned goddess, the Southrons lost but one 
knight, one esquire, and twelve private soldiers, — 
or, to take it at the worst, according to Hume, 
thirteen private soldiers. 

This brought about another revolution ; such is 
the tossing to and fro of those who put to sea on 
the billows of Fortune. Baliol was again acknow- 
ledged king; a parliament was assembled at Edin- 
burgh town ; his peers drew round him with 
bended knee and infinite obeisance, and his title 
was fully confirmed. 

We are compelled to say that Gretna had no- 
thing to do with this : at least, it had no con- 
nexion with the brilliant achievement, any more 
than that Gretna most certainly formed a part of 
the realm in which it took place, and in the event 


BRUCE AND BALIOL. Ill 

of which it was much concerned ; and that both 
Baliol and Douglas, and the English army, had 
in aforetime often marched through the said 
Gretna in their various skirmishes. More than 
this we cannot say. 

During the half-century succeeding, revolutions 
and counter-revolutions once more befel north the 
Cheviots : Bruce was recalled — glaives and clay- 
mores were bared, — battles were lost and won,— 
and Mars, divorced from his wife Venus, stalked 
over the land. * 

About this time the depredations on the border, 
the raids of divers bands of moss-troopers, and 
forays for the purpose, of indiscriminate plunder, 
had become so notorious that the youthful King 
Richard II. led a host over the, frontiers of his 
kingdom proper, to the end that he might stop 
this beginning ; but, whilst he made pleasant 
pastime to himself and his followers by burning 
Edinburgh, Perth, and Dundee, the untrowsered 
Scots in the west also made indifferent good 
pastime to themselves on the arena and stage of 
this veritable history, by devastating the green 
face of the land whithersoever they trod. 

The French had from time to time been the 
close allies of the Scotch, sometimes for the pur- 
poses of mutual combination, strength, and the 
better to overwhelm a common enemy, and at 
others -they had been brought a great deal in con- 


112 MILITARY ANNALS. 

tact for reasons less amicable and beneficial ; but 
in either case the consequence arrived at was, that 
they both became intimate with each other. In 
the former relations it happened, that, when the 
Scotch were collecting their powers against the 
southern moiety of the island, the French (when 
it was their interest) readily sent oyer vast rein- 
forcements to assist them ; and thus it was, that 
during the struggles of the middle ages, whether 
on the frontier or in the more central counties, 
we oftep find the mincing wearers of trunk-hose 
and slashed doublets marshalled in rank and file 
along with the ruder Kelts,' who went with bare 
legs, raw-hide boots with the hair outwards, and 
that scanty Roman legacy, the phiHbeg. 

Owing to the rivalries and jealousies that 
rankled between the neighbouring barons, who 
fought under different colours, it was not possible 
that peace could be maintained between them; 
they were the petty sovereigns of their fief, having 
many vassals under them, ready at their nod to 
do their bidding, however arbitrary, against any 
neighbour or any rival, whether in good or evil. 
As they lived by plunder, and furnished their, 
larders by the proceeds of rapine, the nearest and 
most wealthy barons in their vicinage were often 
their most deadly foes, because they may have 
been the most often preyed upon. Hence '* good 
neighbourhood " in those days, and especially on 


BORDER LAWS. 113 

the territory of which we speak, consisted in 
mutual depredation, robbery, assault, and retalia- 
tion. They paid very little deference to the com* 
mands of their respective sovereigns, kept na- 
tional truces but imperfectly, and made war or 
peace on those around them, just as it suited their 
humour, passions, or larder and store-room. 

Albeit the statutes of the realm at large were 
set at nought, as being in no wise compulsory,—* 
that is, unless it were convenient, — still, for their 
own use, and for the further security of their own 
power in transactions touching themselves, or 
applying to their own peculiar intercourse, they 
established, gradatim, a series of conventional re- 
gulations, which, when collected in a better di- 
gested form in later times, was known by the 
name of the body of Border Laws. The wardens 
of the marches, who were officers appointed by 
the crown to repress the inroads of the dalesmen 
of the antagonist realm, and to maintain good 
order, were empowered to hold courts of justice, 
and decide cases, and return verdicts against 
such offenders as were apprehended and brought 
before them. " Jeddart Justice," or hanging the 
prisoner first and trying him afterwards, was how- 
ever too often the procedure of these courts ; for 
the wardens were despotic and tyrannical, armed 
with the diploma of their sovereign, which gave 
them immense power, and, in themselves^ allowing 


114 MILITARY ANNALS. 

their passions, their revenge, or their hatred to 
award his doom, just as the impulse of the moment 
prompted. 

In seasons of national war, he had the right of 
calling out all the fencible men dwelling within 
the circuit of his wardenry, between the ages of 
sixteen and sixty; and these he headed as captain- 
general, leading them against such freebooters as 
infested his district, or else conducting thjem to the 
more important work of invading the enemy's 
country. On these occasions it was his duty to 
observe, and cause to be observed, all the ancient 
rules and customs which had been recognised as 
laws by common consent amongst the marchmen ; 
and through the barbarism of these enactments 
may be here and there traced the veins of a 
rude yet chivalrous idea of honour. Some of the 
enactments pointed to the observance of equity of 
dealing and the preservation of privilege between 
man and man amongst themselves ; others referred 
to their treatment of their prisoners, non-inter- 
course or traitorous correspondence with any indi- 
vidua! of the obverse country, and such other 
items as enforoed subordination amongst a semi- 
barbarous conjunction of men. Thus, it was laid 
down, that if any soldier followed the chase on a 
horse belonging to his comrade, the true owner 
of the horse was entitled to half the booty taken. 
This was done in order to make them use their 


BORDER LAWS. 115 

own horses, and not appropriate those of their 
neighbours. Again : — He who detected a traitor, 
was rewarded with the sum of one hundred shil- 
lings; and he who aided his escape from justice, 
suffered the pain of death. If the stewards of 
Annandale and Kircudbright omitted to fire the 
beacons, and give timely notice on the approach of 
a foe, they were fined one merk ; and he who 
neglected to join the array of Ihe country to 
oppose the foe at the signal of the beacon-lights, 
forfeited his goods, and was placed at the disposal 
of the warden's will. In the partition of spoil, 
two portions* were allowed to each bowman. 
Whoever deserted his commander and comrades, 
and abode not in the field to the uttermost, for-* 

4 

feited his goods, and became liable to the punish* 
ment of a traitor. Whoever bereft his comrade 
of his horse, spoil, or prisoner, was subject to the 
pains of. treason, if he did not make restitution 

• 

when the right of property became known to him. 

These and certain other military regulations were 
of no small necessity and benefit to those who were 
constantly engaged in Border warfare; indeed, with- 
out hew of some sort or other, no race of beings 
and no order of society, however crude, can at all 
maintain an existence for any length of time* 

Marauders and moss-troopers taken . in the act 
were dealt with in the most summary manner,— 
Jeddart justice, in these cases, being the least 


116 MILITARY ANNALS. 

trouble ; and drowning or hanging were the 
favourite modes of punishment. " The next tree, 
or the deepest pool of the nearest stream," says 
the author of the Border antiquities, " was indiffer- 
ently used on these occasions." 

The principal part of the warden's duty re- 
spected his transactions in the opposite kingdom 
in the time of both peace as well as war ; in short* 
he was the bull- dog stationed at the outer gate, in 
order to guard the national premises. 

The military regulations, hereinbefore discoursed 
of, were arranged by William, Earl of Douglas, 
in the year 1468 ; and the exordium runs 
thus: — "Be it remembered that, on the 18th 
daie of December, 1468, Earle William Douglas 
assembled the whole lordes, freeholders, and eldest 
borderers, that best knowledge had, at the college 
of Linclouden ; and there he caused those lordes 
and borderers bodylie to be sworne, the holie 
Gospel touched, that they justly and trewlie, after 
their cunning, should decrete, decern, deliver, and 
put in order and writinge the statutes, ordinances, 
and uses of Marche that were ordained in Black 
Archibald of Douglas 1 days;" &c. &c. And it 
appears that they were thence adopted by the 
English, after certain necessary -alterations made 
therein ; for a copy of them is found in the MS. of 
Master Bell, a warden clerk of the western 
marches of England in tempore Elizabeths Regina. 


BORDER LAWS. 117 

These frontier Cerberi, who guarded the portals 
of the realm, had the means of formally concluding 
truces with the opposite warden for their own 
jurisdictions, even as they were also able to carry 
death and destruction along with them, if they 
saw fitting to go to warfare ; and the process of 
documentarily making out such an agreement was 
carried through with the show of no small pomp 
and circumstance. 

A notable indenture of this kind was achieved 
between the Percy out of Northumberland, and 
Archibald Douglas, Lord of Galloway, at the 
water of Esk, beside Salon or Solway, tf hen these 
two chieftains bore themselves with all the parade 
of monarchs of interminable kingdoms. 

In times of peace it was the warden's province 
to maintain and cultivate a good understanding 
betwixt all parties ; and to prevent, where it was 
possible, the nightly practice of spoliation and 
plunder by moss-troopers. Few depredators were 
so notorious, and so incorrigible, as the clans of 
the western march ; and, amongst these, more 
particularly the Elliots and Armstrongs of Liddes- 
dale, who, according to the proverb, were " thieves 
all," the Nixons, Grahames, and Crossers of the 
Debateable Land ; and, with shame be it spoken, 
the Johnstones of the since gentle, amiable, and 
most loving soil of Gratney or Gretna. But if 
Gretna was not free from fierce hatred in a by- 


IIS 


MILITARY ANNALS. 


gone age, assuredly she has, in later times, made 
ample amends for past cruelty, by cultivating more 
love in one year within the precincts of her amorous 
parish, than all the parishes in the world are able 
to cultivate besides. 


BORDER FEUDS. 119 


CHAPTER IX. 


■ 

Border feuds : Percy and Douglas. 


A skirmish up in Annan glen, 

In which the English played 
The devil with the Scottish men — 

But were at last repaid. • 

In the iron age of Gretna, there befel a most 
piteous matter in those parts. 

The innocent waters of the Sark ran blood, 
and the shame of the English was dyed in sorrow- 
ful hues, blushed over with crimson ; for the Scots 
harvested glory with their martial reap-hooks, and 
drove their foes before them like bolts from a 
catapult. 

Forays and raids for plunder, incendiarism, and 
such like, were of nightly perpetration, mutually 
carried on between the marchmen of the two 
countries ; not only for the absolute purpose of 
furnishing their larders with store of good beefins 
and kine, being that which none can live without ; 
but furthermore for the wanton purpose of making 


120 BORDER FEUDS. 

pastime and promoting good neighbourhood. A 
community of effects was the custom of all those 
who were puissant enough to enforce it ; that is, 
of all those who needed, and were puissant 
enough to take from the rich : and that which 
a moss-trooper thus seized on, he held without 
any pangs of compunction, considering it morally 
his own rightful property until— - when? why, 
until a stronger than he snatched it from him, 
against his ability to resist; and. then he re- 
signed it, even with the same grace as it had 
been resigned to him by the former possessor — 
swearing oaths that would split oak-planks two 
inches thick, and vowing revenge in time to come. 
Edward I. had sown the poisonous germens of 
a deep-rooted animosity between the two king- 
doms, when he so unamiably usurped the dominion 
of Scotland ; for, before that fatal era, it is noted 
in history, and, still better, in tradition, that the 
deadly feuds, and predatory inroads, had not com- 
menced. His preposterous demands, so rudely 
urged, called the rankest simples out of the con- 
geries of passions whereof the human mind is 
made up, from their hiding-places into action; 
and, when the devil in man has been awaked, 
passing strong must be the narcotic that shall 
be able to put him to sleep again. Hence 
it is, that he slumbered not on the frontier 
from the days of the first Edward of England, 


PERCY AND DOUGLAS. 121 

• 

till the translation of the last James of Scotland ; 
but raved like the foul fiend up and down the 
land, late, early, night, morning, at all tides and 
seasons, knowing no peace, and seeking no quietude. 
The hereditary devil of hatred was awake upon 
the borders. In the particular year, 1380, an 
evil conjunction of fifteen thousand English took 
their hostile way right over Carlisle sands, the 
great Moss, and the district of Gratney at the 
he^d of the Firth, directing their course north- 
ward along the banks of the rivers where the 
beslb pasture grew, and consequently where the 
fattest beeves were wont to browse. Many were 
the bastle-houses and peels walled round about 
with their yard-thick barnkin, that stood upon 
the strongest braes rising above the torrent, 
wherein dwelt the head of the clan, or some 
principal* laird of the wilderness. Such of these 

• 

they attacked as seemed fitting: in some they 
found n6t a soul to dispute their entry, as the 
' occupiers had . fled to the labyrinths of Tarras 
Moss, or some other wild ; so they set fire to the 
building and went their way : in others they found 
the barnkin secured, and the turrets covered with 
spearmen, speaking javelins, and also tossing them 
down. # 

These bastle-houses, as they were called, differed 
essentially from the baronial castles of the lordly 
English, being neither so extensive in their ranges 
vol. i. a 


122 BORDER FEUDS. 

of buildings, towers, or battlemented walls, nor* 
so largely stored in provisions as to enable the 
garrison to resist a protracted siege ; but were 
rather peels of compact build, massive and well 
• cemented, and placed upon crags or eminences, 
or other situations wisely chosen for natural 
strength. The less wealth of the lairds, as com- 
pared with the possessions of the Neustrian peer- 
age from the south, — their less expanded ideas 
of chivalrous luxury, — their smaller knowledge # of 
the pomps, splendour, refinement,, and exclusive- 
ness of the feudal system of the Normans as nrore 
thoroughly established in England, and their more 
inveterately confirmed habits of predation, as 
judged with their more civilized neighbours, — these 
were in a great measure the reasons that directed 
the inferior architecture of their fortresses. 

The lands, also, in the vicinage, were less care- 
fully tilled, than with the. Southrons of that day ; 
since they depended for subsistence rather upon 
the cattle of those whom they chose to plunder," 
than on the vegetable productions of the soil ; 
and thus it was, that on the approach of an in- 
vading enemy, they either shut themselves up 
with bolts and 'bars, and defended themselves 
against a short, thoii^h fierce assault, such as 'they 
thought they could repel, or else, if the invaders 
appeared too numerous for them, or seemed to pur- 
pose a system of protracted warfare, they hastily 


PERCY AND DOUGLAS. 123 

• 

retired to the mountains, driving their sheep and 
beeves along with them. 

In this case they left their* lands, to be wasted 
and their dwellings to be burnt — but we are told 
that neither the wasting nor the burning cha- 
grined them much ; for, in the first place, the 
indifferently cultivated state of the country left 
very little to. destroy ; and, in the second place, 
such was the massiveness of their masonry, that 
the fire did but very little injury to their walls ; 
the only damage being the destruction of the 
floors and roof. These, being made in a rude 
fashion, were easily reconstructed when the spoilers 
had retired. 

Hence,* it is not to be wondered at, that the 
borders for centuries, and to a very late period, 
continued to be more barren and more neglected 
than any other inhabited part of the two king- 
doms whatsoever; for the practice of incursion, 
incendiarism, and ruination, was not of rare occur- 
rence, befalling as it may be peradventure, once 
or so in the .generation of a man, but 'on the 
contrary, came to the moss trooper as naturally 
as the setting of the evening sun, so that blind 
indeed was that owl who opened his eyes # at 
cock-shut time, if he did not witness preparations 
for a raid regularly every night. 

On the occasion of which we speak in this 
especial chapter, the incursors principally ravaged 

6 2 


124 BORDER FEUDS. 

Annandale and. Nitbsdale, together with the other 
dells and dales that lay on their line of trans- 
cnrsion ; and here, from their irresistible num- 
bers, they should seem to have had their own 
way, -and to have wrought their own. will with 
the riches of the land, such as they found. 

The Scoto-Saxon " Red-shanks " as they Were 
termed, owing to their going bare-legged, and 
owing to the severity of the climate, which turned 
them of that numb-cold hue, had adopted a 
system of tactics much like what we find to ob- 
tain, in the present day amongst the savages of. 
the back-w&ods. They avoided decided pitched 
battles in the open plain, and rather preferred 
what is termed bush Jighting in the forest and 
on the prairie. They employed a wasting, de- 
sultory, scattered, ambush-laying method, by which 
their foes were harassed, surprised, or perplexed: 
where they had previously put grain into the 
ground, they destroyed it with vast assiduity, 
thus leaving no harvests to be reaped by those 
who did not sow ; and as they retreated off these 
fields to the hills with their cattle, they viewed 
with little concern any further works.. of devasta- 
tion which might be perpetrated by the new 
comers. 

Secured in these inaccessible places, they cun- 
ningly watched their opportunity for taking ven- 
geance and making a full retaliation : they allowed 


PERCY AND DOUGLAS. 


125 


e 


their ftos to work their will ; they suffered them 
to plunder whatsoever they had been unable to 
carry to the mountains, and to burn the floors 
and roofs of their battle-houses; they let them 
overrun the plains without impediment, feeling 
they could do small injury where everything was 
desert ; and then, when the time came, they 
rushed into England with incredible fury, and 
there enacted the same horrors which had before 

» « 

beem enacted in Scotland. 

This ferocious and uncompromising mode of 
warfare had been strongly recommended in the 
rhymes considered as a legacy from Robert Bruce 
to his successors, and which indeed do, at this 
very day, comprise the most . effectual And almost 
the only defensive measures which can be adopted 
by a poor and mountainous country, when invaded 
by the overpowering armies of a wealthy neigh- 
bour. 

The learned Fordun, jn his Scotichronicon, sets 
forth in " quaint Itiglis" the practices of his 
countrymen in such pastimes, showing how they 
should rather fight on foot than on horseback, 
as being then more able in the glen to flit from 
rock, to rock, or eschew the foe by retiring into 
secret places ; that a bow and a spear were the 
best walls of protection that a man could have ; 
that it was their usage to secrete their stores 
in unknown retreats, whilst they laid bare the 


126 BORDER FEUDS, 

extended valley when their enemies approached, — 
and that, by loud alarums in the night, they 
would terrify these enegiies off their land. " This," 
says Fordun, " is the sage counsel of King Ro- 
berths testament : — 

" This is the counsell and intente 
Of goode Kinge Robert's teslamente." 

But let us to the point — 

* 

So numerous waft the host of English that now 
forded the Sark and penetrated up the glens of 
the Annan and the Nith, in comparison with ' the 
weaponshaw which the natives could hastily collect 
on the instant , that they wisely slunk away on their 
approach, scattering themselves about in the thick- 
ets so as to prevent the possibility of being surroun- 
ded and overwhelmed at one fell swoop, and secur- 
ing to themselves by this dispersedness, the meatas 
of keeping good watch, until the time should pre- 
sent itself when they might rush from their conceal- 
ments, and return the favour with a wannion. 
They were even pleased, not only to destroy the 
crops that grew upon the bosom of Mother Earth, 
that their foes should not gather, but they also 
dismantled their dwellings as they retired, some- 
times burning away the interior, leaving only a 
smoky and blackened shell, and at others, going 
so far as to demolish the walls, and eradicate 
the very .foundations from the rock out of which 


o 


PERCY AND DOUGLAS. 187 

they sprung. For they had long discovered 
that, albeit they lacked nothing of animal courage 
when debating it hotly with crossed blades hand 
to hand, still in systematic invasions, they were 
far inferior in scientific- stratagem to the belted 
knights .of England ; that they succeeded best in 
hasty attack, precipitate escalade, and fierce charge ; 
that they were deficient in the strict discipline 
which would take them step . by step . patiently 
through a long campaign ; and that though they 
could beat off their besiegers from a short assail- 
ment upon their fortlets, they were, owing to their 
slender resources in an impoverished district, and 
their deficiency of discipline amongst themselves, 
rarely able to withstand the tedious approaches of 
a regular blockade. The existence .of peel-houses, 
therefore, along the border, they found to be rather 
a detriment to their safety than otherwise, since not 
being strong enough to retain them to themselves, 
they found that they had. only been building them 
for .their enemies. They were truly the sparrows 
who built their nests, whilst the English were the 
cuckoos who turned them out and dwelt in them. . 
The good Lord James Douglas — he who was 
commissioned to carry the. heart of his King to 
Jerusalem, but which he flung at the Moors during 
the onset of a battle with them in Spain on his 
way eastward — the good Lord James Douglas 
surprised his own castle in Lanarkshire three seve- 




128 


BORDER FEUDS. 


ral times, it having been, as frequently taken from 
him and garrisoned by these superior disciplina- 
rians, and on each occasion, that they should not 
play the cuckoo thus with him, he was at the pains 
of demolishing it. 

The military system of Wallace was on the 
same principle ; and in fine, with very few excep- 
tions, the strong and extensive fortresses which 
had arisen oil the Scottish side of the Marches dur- 
ing the better times preceding the usurpation of 
Edward I., were levelled with the ground when • 
the troublous period of the thirteenth century com- 
menced. 

These facts h$ve been acutely commented on by 
that interminable writer, Sir Walter of Abbots* 
ford; and he further assures us, in language of 
most pleasant reading, that the castles of Rox- 
burgh, Jedburgh, and divers others, erected in 
"the good old times," were infinitely more .ex- 
tensive than any which were built in after days, 
— that they could not be pulled down, such was 
their massive solidity, and such the unskilfulness 
of the Scotch in the arts of destruction, — and that, 
to raze the stronghold of Jedburgh, it could scarce- 
ly be done without so much time and labour as 
would render it necessary to impose a tax of two 
pennies upon every hearth in the land to defray 
the expense. But the Duke of Albany, then 
Regent, perceiving the unpopularity of the impost, 


PERCY AND DOUGLAS. 12U 

drew the required sums out of the Crown revenues. 
But we forget ourselves again : 

We have told the most forbearing reader, that 
an immense body of men out of Cumberland had 
entered over the gentle soil where Gretna lies, 
and were beginning a ferocious herriment of all 
the parts adjacent. 

Up Nithside they went without let or hin- 
derance, not because the dalesmen took pleasure 
at their coming, or welcomed them with acco- 
lades and tender embracements about the neck, 
but because they were impotent to oppose so large 
a company, and therefore were enforced to let 
them have their own way. This expedition seems 
to have been a pay-off against the Scots, who had 
been latterly intruding without irritation into se- 
veral of the counties lying south of the works of • 
Hadrian not pertaining to them, Or shaded under 
the folds o£ that banner which bears Azure, a Sal- 
tire Argent, for St. Andrew : for a fierce animosity 
had lately arisen out of a murder committed at 
Roxburgh fair in a scuffle, when a servant of the 
Earl of March fell dead, because a long piece of 
.cold steel had been spitted right through his deli- 
cate viscera — and men's viscera can in no wise 
endure such usage. 

To retaliate for this, the said Earl, together 

with his brother german; the "ditto of Moray, 

assembled their followers, and duly attending the 

g 5 


W- 


130 BORDER FEUDS. 

next fair at Roxburgh, slew all of the offending 
party they could come within weapon's length of, 
and then set fire to the town. The English, 
haying suffered greatly on this occasion, thought 
(it to invade Scotland forthwith, for the purpose 
of taking vengeance on the Earls ; and in their 
way they ruined the estate of Sir John Gordon; 
a man of vast property thereabout : and as no- 
thing tries the equanimity of people's tempers so 
much as having their property wantonly destroyed 
before their faces, we must not marvel if Sir John 
was a little ruffled afterwards. Certain it is, he 
lost no time in rushing wrathfully into England, 
where he made himself master of a large booty 
in cattle and prisoners without commiseration, and 
savagely slew alt and every one who opposed him. 
Lord Percy theh drew together seven thou- 
sand spears and' bowmen, wherewith he ran a like 
career; and the .consequence was, that .the border 
war raged inveterately on both sides — and con- 
tinued to do so uninterruptedly for several years. 
Roxburgh fair again became foul with deeds of 
slaughter ; the. peers of each nation visited, reci- 
procally, sometimes the lands of the one and, 
sometimes the lands of another, dispensing their 
favours to all in succession ; and not long before 
the expedition into Diftnfrieshire, . of which we 
have been endeavouring to speak throughout this 
chapter, we find the Percy, now Earl of North- 


PERCY AND DOUGLAS. 131 

umberland, hurling desolation around him at the 
head of ten thousand slaughtermen. 

* 

When the English had burnt and destroyed, to 
their numerous hearts' contents, everything they 
came near in the dales of Nith and Annan, they 
turned about and directed th£ir steps homeward, 
carrying a rich booty along with them. Being 
big with success and assured of their triumph, 
they paced it easily right over the territory of 
Gretna Green, until they neated the disembogue- 
ment of the Sark into the Firth. As it had now 
become night, their progress was necessarily re- 
tarded, first by the obscurity, and next by the 
badness of the ground near the vicinage of the 
dangerous moss ; but behold, these mighty victors 
were incontinently stricken with a sore panic, so 
that their haughty souls began to give way, and 
their stalwart limbs to tremble : for, there as they 
stood round about where the toll-gate near the 
bridge may be seen, and of which hereafter, the 
•drums of their ears were dinned by the sudden 
sound of many voices shouting in the dark. 

At this the hitherto conquerors quailed piteously, , 
and not knowing how to cuff an invisible foe, 
betook themselves to precipitate and ignoble flight. 
A handful of five hundred §cots rushed in . upon 
the host of fifteen thousand English, and taking 
them much as Gideon and his men had taken 
the Midianites of old, indiscriminately slew great 


m 


BORDER FEUDS. 


numbers of the Southrons, driving the rest like 
feathers before a whirlwind. And the English 
ran — oh ! how they ran — and in their terror they 
jumped into the briny surges of the Solway, leav- 
ing their plunder and their many dead behind, 
divers of them becoming unwilling divers into the 
waters, where they perished because they could 
not breathe so inspissated an element. Still the 
Scots fought, and the English fought, but the 
Scots prevailed, and the English failed; and the 
Scots recovered the lost treasure again, and took 
prisoners, not a few over and above. Some man- 
aged, by dint of much floundering, to gurgle their 
way across the Firth and the Sark, till they crept 
out, somewhat humid, upon the opposite bank ; 
and, without tarrying there' for a change of dry 
linen, they ran on the nine miles to Carlisle with 
the water rolling in their ears, and their hair wet- 
ting their shirt collars ; where they nartated to. the 
Cumberlanders therein dwelling, all the circum- 
stances of their mishap. ' 


BORDER FEUDS. 133 


CHAPTER X 


Border Feuds. 


The Battle of the Sark was fought 
Hard by the Solway Firth ; 
' * But. sure the victory was bought 
For more than it -was worth. 

Bickerings at home and broils domestic had 
made so much ado for Richard II. and Henry IV., 
that Scotland had .been disregarded for some 
years. Wat Tyler had been put down, and the 
bloody dagger added to the dexter chief of the 
city of London awns ; the war of the Roses had 
commenced ; the Duke of Lancaster had returned 
from banishment, and had deposed his cousin ; 
Owen Olendower had been chastised; and now 
that the Scotch had been taking advantage of 
these commotions by ravaging the northern coun- 
ties of England to such an extent as to be no 
longer endurable/- Henry projected an expedition 
into the Highlands. He proceeded as far as 


134 BORDER FEUDS. 

Edinburgh, where he summoned Robert III. to 
do homage for his crown, much after the*precedents 
of his predecessors ; and, three weeks having 
elapsed, findipg that the red-shanks would neither 
fight him or allow him to fight them, but preferred 
retiring to their mountains with their cattle, he 
veered about once more for his own country, and 
disbanded his army. 

Scotland was suffering severely from internal 
commotions ; the Earl of Buchan had been evil 
entreating the land at the head of his catterenes 
or Caledonian banditti ;* and the Duke of Albany 
had removed one obstacle between himself and the 
throne, by starving his eldest nephew, David, to 
death, in prison. Robert, being duly advertised 
of the wicked design of his brother the Duke, and 
fearing lest his only remaining son, James, should 
share a like fate, in which event, Albany would 
succeed to the sovereignty if he outlived him, 
the king secretly despatched a vessel containing 
the prince his only heir, purposing to send him to 
the care and protection of the court of France ; but, 
alack, and well away ! the vessel was captured off 
Flamborough Head by a privateer, and James, 
who was then no more than nine years old, was 
borne away in triumph to Henry IV. of England, 
and committed to the Tower. 

The tidings of this piteous a&air killed Robert 
III: in three days! 


BORDER FEUDS. 135 

Although forays and local skirmishes on the bor- 
ders never ceased to give employment to the Dales- 
men and Deucalidonians, yet, for many.yeass suc- 
ceeding the death of Robert, the governments did 
not. formally enter upon a national warfare. They 
bad other matters to attend to, and, therefore, let 
each other alone. 

The powers of England had long been turned 
into a different channel : France Jiad been won 
out of the hands of her monarch and people by the 
armies of Henry V. ; and then, by a sudden 
revolution in. fortune, that wonderful woman, the 
Maid "of Orleans, had beaten the English pre- 
cipitately off every hyde of land in the country. 
The quarrels of the White and Red Roses had, 
by this time, become a serious affair: Henry VL. 

and Edward IV. had met with various success on 

• 

the Jmttle field, and had alternately been inhabit- 
ing, now the palace and now the prison : and 
it was not until after the battle of Tquton, when 
the Lancastrians were defeated, and Henry fled to 
Scotland to crave the protection of James III., 
that this northern kingdom again arose as a notable 
object to the attentions of Englishmen. 

But he did not long remain in his lurking 
place ; for he rushed . out into open day and 
the face of his enemies, from whom he received 
various fortune during the vicissitudes of times 
sequent. 


136 BORDER FEUDS. 

# 

On the septentrional side of the border, " the 
snn of Douglas set in blood :" that great family 
had become so powerful, and too often so disaffect- 
ed, that the nobles, as .well as the prince, had 
doomed it to destruction. The sixth Earl and 
his brother were murdered in Edinburgh Castle; 
James II. poignarded the successor of these with 
his own hand at Stirling : and the next who 
enjoyed the title, unable any longer to maintain 
his authority, was defeated, first at Arkinholme in 
Annandale, and afterwards at Burnswark near 
Dumfries, where he was made prisoner by a son of 
Kirkpatrick of Closeburn, one of his quondam 
vassals. 

44 The Battle of the Sark," so called, wherein 
we come directly upon the boards of our drama, 
was fought in 1447, when the English met with 
a remarkably similar fate to that which we have . 
elsewhere related, when their immense host, was 
scared into .the waters by a mere handful in com-' 
•parison. • 

The mighty English took exceptions at the' 
Scottish monarch, apd fell at jars with his majesty 
because he chose to select a wife for himself, 
forsooth ! at th6 suggestion of Charles of France. 
It is not likely that the English had any scheme 
for a marriage at Gretna, which the new match 
never hinted at ; but in matters of marriage Eng- 
land always likes to be father, mother, guardian, and 


BORDER FEUDS. 137 

everything else, over foreign princes and princesses, 
and to give their Wards away just as England* 
pleases: and as foreign princes and princesses 
don't like on every occasion to succumb to this 
un-understandable authority, they venture to choose 
for themselves, without asking consent of their 
testy and domineering would-be great grand- 
mamma. 

*Tp chastise the rough-footefl Scots for their 
presumption, the Earl of Salisbury crossed over 
the western marches by the Sands of Burgh, and 
made for the town of Dumfries: in this he com- 
mitted certain excesses, such as oftentimes *attend 
on the steps of war ; and, by way of a crowning 
mercy, he set the plaqe in flames, and burnt it 
9 to the ground: 

The Earl of Northumberland invaded the M.erse, 
and amused hiinself by doing the same to Dunbar 
at the same time ; but, as his exploits were not 
celebrated on our own particular arena, we must 
not wander from our subject to celebrate them 
here. As there . were heroes who lived before 
Agamemnon,* so there were historians who lived 
before us; and, for all we know, ^hey have re- 
corded the rare deeds which have been done by 
.great men, whether within, without, or round 
about Dunbar. 

In return for the compliment of the "Earl of 
Salisbury at Dumfries, Sir John Douglas of Bal- 


188 BORDER PEUDS. 

veny marched into Cumberland, and made re- 
prisals by plundering or destroying all he could 

* 

come near, whether of person or property. This 
was an amiable way, surely, of making things 
square between them. 

The English armies, in high' dudgeon that their 
foes should dare to murder and rob, even as they 
had just been doing, hastened back into their 
own country, only to levy still greater forces, 
that they might commit still greater excesses ; 
and now, under the commandment of the Percy 
out of Northumberland, together with ''Magnus 
with the red- wane" as .the Scots called this 
lieutenant, owing to a prodigiously long, bushy, 
and carroty beard, they prepared to carry ruin 
over Solway Moss and the river • Sark. This 
Magnus was a soldier of fortune, who had been 
serving in the French ranks on the continent of 
Gaul, because he had nothing else to do for re- 
creation ; and, much like most other volunteers 
who enlist for the same reason, he was always 
ready to hit at anybody who came nearest, or 
most comfortably • within arm's length. It mat- 
tered little to him who it might be; for as he 
fought for amusement, and out of the pure delight 
he derived from flinging his steel brand about 
him, the first, who came was always the first that 
was served. 

This soldier had an indifferent good sort of 


BORDER FEUDS. 139 

opinion of His. great manhood, not thinking meanly 
of himself, or of his abilities in the art of jesting 
with an enemy ; and being well inflated with this 
buoyant self-assurance, he is said to have de- 
manded from the English court no other recom- 
pense for the martial achievements which he was 
about to perform, than that he should enjoy and 
call his own all the broad acres (or counties per- 
adventure) that he meant to conquer in Scot-, 
land. With such an opportunity of winning unto 
himself an immeasurable territory/ who indeed 
would not fight with a strong arm? and, of a 
truth, .he had fully purposed to lay about him 
with no sparing hand, but with infinite willing- 
ness to dispense his courtesies unto all whom it 
might concern. . 

An it be that Magnus, who drew his blade 
under the Percy's banner in this", expedition 1 , did 
not fight for money, -(which is the meanest pos- 
sible form in which to receive recompense,} he, 
at least, was not fired with the high and refined 
notions of disinterested patriotism, such as we 
have been essaying to inculcate. 

The Scotch, having had timely intimation of 
the invasjon, raised a numerous army to oppose 
it, the chief commanders being George Douglas, 
Earl of Ormond, Wallace of Craigie, and the 
Lords Maxwell and Johnston. 

The English multitude trampled down the feeds 


• 


140 BORDER FEUDS. 

on the banks of the Eden and the Esk, and the 
moss, fern, and heather, upon the flats of the 
Solway; the warriors were enforced to wet their 

* shoon as they forded the Sark, for the neat stone 
bridge which now spans the stream was not built 
then. 

.They forthwith proceeded to lay ' waste the 
whole of this matrimonial district; in which they 
succeeded, if not. to admiration, at least to won- 
derment; and # they made no scruple of seizing, 
plundering, or enthralling, every .borderer they 
could come near. But it was declared that the 
Earl of Ormond was marching down upon them 
from the north with vast .expedition ; wherefore 
the invaders hastily called in their straggling 
parties, and encamped upon the banks .of the 
river, which is now spanned by that bridge which 
has borne more lovers than any other bridge in 
Christendom— or Pagandom 'either. 

Their advanced guard was commanded by Mag- 

. nus aforesaid, who fought as disinterestedly for his 

sovereign as many others had done before him, 

and as many others continue to do after him ; 

the Earl of Northumberland led on the centre ; 

^ and the rear, which was composed mostly of 
Welsh, now fully under the yoke of England, 
was headed by Sir John Pennington. 

The Scotch, by this time within sight, and 
bravqly marshalled in battle array, drew up in« 


BORDER FEUDS. 


141 


three divisions also, face to face, and almost within 
spear's length. Their right wing was commanded 
by Wallace, the left by Maxwell and Johnston, 
and the centre by Ormond himself. * Before the 
strife of weapons began, this last nobleman ha- 
rangued his naked-kneed followers with much elo- 
quence, using forcible words to inflame their re- 
sentment against the new comers, by declaring 
that they had violated the existing truce, and 
that they merited nothing but hard blows, and 
those, too, not given with the flats of their swords. 
The signal was made, and with great impetuous- 
ity the right wing under Wallace rushed upon 

o 

the antagonist van led by Magnus. At first the 
English archers gained a slight advantage ; but 
the valour of Wallace, his .example in lancing* 
forward into the thickest of the fight, together 
with certain cheering words which he broached 
on the occasion, served to turn the fortune of the 
day in his favour, and especially to make Magnus 
look small, and his conquered acres still less. The 
encounter now became general ; and such was the 
rigour, animosity, and fierceness of the Scots, that 
no effort could drive them back ; the advantage 
they had gained they held to stoutly, and still 
continued to gain more and more. Magnus fell ' 
dead, bravely contending to the last; and the 
English, seeing their champion overthrown, and 
seeing the divisions under Northumberland and 


142 BORDER FEUDS. 

Pennington completely routed gave up all for 

lost, and* fled away toward the Solway. It 

chanced to be high tide, so that the brine of the 

sea, flowing* up into th6 channel of the Sark, 

covered the fords and filled the banks of the river 

to the topmost verge ; -and in these swollen waters 

the panic-stricken vanquished were drowned by 

multitudes. 

Lord Percy, Northumberland's eldest son, Sir 

John Pennington, Sir Rpbert Harrington, and 

others, were made prisoners. The English lost 

at least' three thousand men ; whilst the. Scots 

missed but six hundred, and none of them of 

* 
consideration saving Wallace, wbo died of his 

hurts three months afterwards. 


TREATY OF PEACE. . • 143 


CHAPTER XL 

Treaty of Peace between James IV. of Scotland and Henry 
VII. of England, — Minority of James V. — His Adventures 
in disguise. — The Qaberlunzie Man. 

King James the Fifth in Scotland reign'«d 

Like many other kings ; 
He did* some common-place affairs, 

And divers curious things. 

After the fall of the House of Douglas, no 
one chieftain seems to have been especially potent 
on the Borders until some time further, when the 
sixth Earl of Angus, ycleped Bell-the-Cat, made 
rapid strides to power. He was Warden of the 
east and middle marches, Lord of Liddesdale and 
Jedwood forest, and possessed of the strong castles 
of Tantallon, Douglas, and Hermitage. 

Respected more for his lineage than for his virtues; 
he found a -large body of the nobility of the land, 
who thought more of lineage than virtue, ready so 
far to obey his treasonable behests as to assail, 
with him, the foundations of the throne, on 
which sat James III : and, in fine, matters came 
to such a pass, that the disaffected assembled an 


144 MINORITY OF JAMES V. 

*army with which they attacked and slew the king, . 
near the village of Bannockburn, where Brace, in 
aforetime had achieved worthier things. James's 
army was composed of Highlanders, who could in . 
no wise resist the men of Annandale and Liddes- 
dale, who carried spears two ells longer than those 
used by the rest of their countrymen. 

James IV. was a vigorous, energetic, and active 
prince, but head-strong and self-opiniated — failings 
which at fast proved his ruin. A treaty of perpetual 
peace was concluded between him and Henry VII. 
of England in 1503, and by way -of cementing 
the good understanding, he wedded at Edinburgh 
(not at Gretna) Margaret the eldest daughter of 
.this king. In the aubsequent reign of Henry 
VIII.,. a series of complaints were brought against 
some Scots , abroad, who were blowing, upon the 
embers of an ancient quarrel they had had with 
the Portuguese, and which had nearly died out. 
With this the English had had nothing to do ; 
but as its reviviscence now clashed with English 
interests, it brought about a rupture, which was 
never thoroughly made up: 

James invaded England in 1513, and was de- 
feated : and on the 9th of September in the same 
. year, contrary to the advice of all- his councillors 
of war, he encountered his newly declared enemies 
at Flodden Field, where he was. slain* 

During the ' minority of James V., Scottish 


HIS ADVENTURES IN DISGUISE. 145 

affairs were in a most troublous and disordered state : 
the nobles were ignobly plotting against each other 
and the regency : the Queen mother was counter- 
plotting against them; the chieftains on the borders 
were devouring each other by rapine and violence ; 
and the English of Cumberland and Northumber- 
land, not unassisted sometimes by the government, 
were cruelly ravaging the Merse, the Debateable 
Land, and all the parts adjacent, so that, as Cardi- 
nal Wolsey observed, "There was left neither 
house, fortress, village, tree, cattle, corn, or other 
succour for man." 

The piratical system of moss-trooping was now 
in its meridian ; as regularly as the sun set, parties 
of marauders set out to plunder their neighbours of 
their beeves and sheep, which parties, if pursued, 
fled to the fastnesses of Tarras Moss, or the De- 
bateable Land ; the dislocated government had no 
power, or no inclination to check this state of 
things ; and by this time, the thieves of Annan- 
dale and Liddesdale had become notorious. 

James V., like the eastern king in the Arabian 
Nights, took much pleasure in paying visits to his 
unsuspecting subjects muffled up in the dark features 
of disguise. He would iiabit himself in the vesture 
of a country loon, and enter the kitchen of the 
farmer's gudewife, with whom he would hold dis- 
course on the prospects of the coming harvest, the 
treatment of landlords, and the government of the 

VOL. I. H 


146 JAMES'S ADVENTURES. 

king ; or he would assume the tatters of a gaberlun- 
zie man, and try the courtesy and alms-giving of the 
noble, gentle, and simple, as his fantasy directed. 
• '. There appear to have been two motives for the 
adoption of this practice : in the first place, he was 
naturally enamoured of romance, sport, and adven- 
ture ; and in the second place, such was the in- 
efficiency of deputies in the correction of abuses, 
such the feebleness of the administrators of justice, 
as compared with the power of the turbulent, such 
the intrigues of the barpns in plotting and counter- 
plotting against himself and each other, and such 
the difficulty in coming at the real truth in re- 
gard to the condition of his people in distant parts 
of his kingdom, that he resolved personally to 
visit such places as he was desirous of gaining 
knowledge about, and to see into the actual 
amount of existing grievances with his own eyes. 

In the amusing prosecution of these adventures, 
he unreservedly went into either the hall of the 
castle, pertaining to any of his noble retainer or 
into the hut of the cotter who dwelt on the moor. 
To these last, his peregrinations were most especi- 
ally directed, so that at last he wq§ styled* " The 
king of the poor." 

Thai the royal author of the Gaberlunzie Man 
was also the hero of the exploit therein so blithely 
chanted, is a point on which antiquaries are 
pretty well agreed. If he has not received con- 


THE GABERLUNZIE MAN. 147 

viction' of its paternity from circumstantial evi- 
dence, at all events, sentence has been unanimous- 
ly passed on him from " habit and repute/ 9 as the 
Scottish men of law say. 

One cold night during the inclement season of 
the year, as the gudewife of a certain cotter was 
busied about her domestic matters, assisted by a 
comely maiden, her daughter, there came to the 
door an ancient-looking man dressed in beggar's 
weeds. After bidding her many good den good 
e'ens, he besought her of her courtesy to give him 
lodging, until he could again proceed on his pere- 
grination. 

The laws of hospitality were such, that she 
needed no second request, but incontinently grant- 
ed to him her welcome, her vivers, — those indeed 
that might be found in her scantily furnished cup- 
board,— and also a resting-place for the night. 

Thus received, he sat down by the fire with 
hearty good will, for he was wet with the recent 
shower ; his spirits rose, he brightened up at the 
thought of his comfortable quarters ; and by way 
of making acquaintance with the daughter, -he 
patted her on the shoulder — a liberty in so old a 
man that was readily pardoned. So high indeed 
did the ebullition of his gaiety effervesce, that he 
irresistibly burst forth in melody, and joyously 
vociferated divers excellent songs. 

It is not the cassock nor the hood that will 

H 2 


148 JAMES'S ADVENTURES. 

make the holy monk, nor the veil that will make 
the unspotted vestal, nor the superfine coat that 
will make the modern gentleman, nor the tattered 
weeds that will make the penniless beggar. 

Never mind; here was a supposed old gaber- 
lunzie that needed victuals and shelter; and for 
these necessaries he, in return, did .all he could to 
amuse his entertainers. 

Either his merry sayings, or his pleasant tales of 
adventure, so divertingly narrated to the maiden, 
or else the discovery that she might have made, 
of his not being the uncomely wight, he had re- 
presented, or else, in addition to this, the few 
sweet words which he slily poured into ^ her ears 
when the mother was at the further end of the 
kitchen ; these, some or all of them, so wrought 
upon the ardency of her youthful heart, that his 
society and his converse had now become intensely 
agreeable to her, so that she did not know how 
she should ever again be able to do without them. 
The good easy mother little suspected the 
change that had suddenly come o'er the spirit of 
her daughter, and dreamt not of the nature of 
the turn their dialogue had taken. 

He declared to her that he would willingly go 
with her to the world's end, whithersoever the 
fates should direct : and she, having been abso- 
lutely poisoned by the delicious venom of his pro-, 
testations, confessed that she was -dead to every 


THE GABERLUNZIE MAN. 140 

care but love, and would blindly follow him, even 
where, when, and how he should choose to lead. 

Affairs had now arrived at a somewhat critical 
position. 

Between these two a plot was concocted ; the 
purpose of which was, that they should both elope 
and escape away together in the middle of the 
night. 

Alas for love ! it is a glorious passion when it 
is wise and well directed ; but if it is suffered to 
run wild, it will ofttimes lead its slaves into sore 
perplexities. ° 

They arose a short time before the cock crew ; 
they carefully lifted the latch of the door, and 
then, finding themselves withoutside, they closed it 
behind them, and fled away into the wilderness. 

Oh, the unbounded liberty of the wilderness ! 
Ye may wander north, south, east, west, up and 
down, right and left, free, unfettered, unimpeded ; 
ye may also knaw roots and grubs, if bakers' shops 
fail ; or ye may starve upon nothing, and die in 
a quagmire, — and aobody know anything about 
it. 

When the bright eye of the sun opened upon 
the hills in the morning, then did the gudewife 
open her eyes also ; leisurely she lifted herself 
from her pallet, and leisurely, says the chronicle, 
did she put her vestments about her. 

Her first hospitable solicitude was to know how 


150 THE GABERLUNZIE MAN. 

the gaberlunzie had slept ; wherefore she took her 
course toward the servant's room which had been 
given up to him. On entering therein, she found 
it empty ; she proceeded further with a sentiment 
of astonishment springing up within: her ; she went 
to the bed where he had lain ; the straw was cold 
— the beggar had vanished. 

She wrung her hands, she raved, she filled the 
house with lamentations loud and deep ; every 
one was in a stir, and troubled with a thousand 
conjectures. 

Some, in° affright, ran to the coffers to see 
whether anything had been stolen ; others ran to 
the cupboards and chests, in order to assure them- 
selves of the extent of the robbery that had been 
committed on them. Nothing, howbeit, was miss- 
ing. Everything was safe, perfect, and in its 
place as afore. 

Thus relieved in apprehension, though still per- 
plexed with the greatest wonderment, the mother 
returned in some degree to -her senses. She 
breathed freer, she ceased ker sorrowings, and 
she assuaged her tears. 

. " Since nothing is missing as we can see," said 
she to her servant maid, " since the churn in the 
dairy is safe, and the milk untouched, go now and 
awaken my daughter, and bid her tome hither." 

Alack then, if. it must be so; now the real 
amount of her affliction must be revealed. 


THE GABERLUNZIE MAN. . 151 

The servant went to the maiden's room, but 
had not one half crossed the floor, ere she was 
stricken with as much amazement as ever had 
troubled the whole household just before. 

" Thei sheets were cold and she was away," 
says the ancient and royal historiographer: and 
the servant came screaming back to her mistress, 
declaring that, forsooth, she was off with the 
Gaberlunzie man ! 

Now then did a thousand distracting passions 
cruelly torture every dweller in that habitation. 
The old woman well nigh went out of her wits ; 
she hastily resolved on divers plans for pursuing 
the fugitives, sometimes this way, sometimes the 
other, in any or every likely direction in which 
they may have fled ; but so sorely racked was 
she with fears and vexations, that although she 
formed these planB of pursuit, and although she 
desired eagerly to undertake them herself, still, as 
she could not guess as to which way they might 
have gone, and as she wished every known road 
explored, and as die could not take every one of 
them her single self, she became at last so con- 
fused, so anxious, and so bewildered, that she 
could do nothing at all in the matter. 

She hurried some on horseback to ride the coun- 
try over, and some she despatched to run off 
through by-roads and crooked paths, to look, to 
search, to hunt, to inquire. 


152 k THE GABERLUNZIE MAN. 

She never thought of despatching any one to 
Gretna ; but Gretna was nothing then. No mat- 
ter, they had not gone to Gretna — at least, we 
do not know for certain whether they had or not ; 
at all events, they had not gone to the village of 
Springfield, for as we said before, they had fled 
into the wilderness. 

Still, says the chronicle, she never ceased to 
curse and to ban : and according to her command- 
ments, seconded by the anxiety of the whole 
establishment, her vassals never ceased to ride and 
to run. 

Truth, however, will at last prevail ; and mys- 
tery, deception, mistake, and ignorance, will have 
an end. 

In a most secluded and retired glen, "where 
none could see," the ancient gaberliinzie-man and 
the young maiden were at last discovered, com- 
fortably enjoying the solace of a cpuntry life : they 
were sporting away the time in loving discourse, 
and, at the moment of discovery, were discussing 
their vivers, for we are told that they were cut- 
ting a slice from a new cheese. 

So content were they with the issue of the 
exploit and with each other's society, that he 
vowed to love her for aye with words most ar- 
dent; and she positively declared that certainly 
and truly, she should be very loth to leave him : 


THE GABERLUNZIE MAN. 153 

she. confessed it honestly — she would not conceal 
it — she did allow, most sincerely, that she should 
be much grieved to leave him. * 

" But," added she with some apprehension, 
"if my mother knew that I were now with you* 
greatly would she indeed be troubled." 

" My dear," quoth he in return, " harbour no 

fears and no misgivings on her account. You 

have not yet learnt the beggar's dialect, such as 

will enable you to accompany me from town to 

town, and pleasantly to carry on the gaberluqzie 

traffic. Mislike me not for what I have done. 

I will earn thee bread by my industry and the 

sale of my wares : my spinnels and quhorles, and 

other matters of merchandise, together with the 

love we bear each mother, will carry, us to the 

world's end — and back again if we list. I will 

bow my leg, and crook my knee, and draw a 

black patch over my eye, so that folks shall say 

I be' crippled and blind : and this disguisement, 

shown up to the inspection of the King's lieges 

(who, in his chevisanbe, will be blinder than we), 

shall be a rare subject for merriment with us. 

Whilst pity and alms be the meed that they 

will plentifully showed upon the old gaberlunzie- 

man, we will sing in the security of our secret, 

and be blithesome." 

What could she do ? how could she help it ? 

h5 


1 54 THE GABERLUNZIE MAN. 

If she had been reluctant to comply, she could 
not have refrained; but not being one whit re- 
lu ctant, she did not even try to refrain. 

How sweet are the words of those who urge 
us to do the very thing we desire ! 

If the facetious monarch honestly restored the 
gudewife to her peace, and the maiden to her 
home, after he had satisfied his liking for adven- 
ture, he made her taste happiness indeed, after 
the anxiety whereinto he had at first plunged 
hex : and if tricks and practical jokes be untrise 
to play, the least that can be afterwards done is, 
to make an ample amends. But it is dangerous to 
play with young ladies' hearts. Some fancy that 
their hearts are very tough, and will bear a deal 
of pulling , about : this is a mistake : they are 
made of egg-shell, and are easily crushed. 


THE WIDOW OF ANN AND ALE. 155 


CHAPTER XII. 


The Widow of Annandale, Sir John Charters, and the King. 


The story of the widow told 

That lived in Annandale : 
It does much credit to the king, 

And is a goodly tale. 

When the king was progressing through the 
south-western counties of Scotland, for the pur- 
pose of noting the depredations of the moss- 
troopers round about Solway, a widow, who lived 
by -the water of Annan, came to him one day 
with a piteous tale of injury done to her by some 
lawless Southrons. She told him that a party 
of these cruel foes had made an incursion oyer 
the border, had attacked her house in passing 
through the dale, and had brought irreparable 
ruin and calamity upon her, by carrying off her 
son and her two cows. The former was her last 
support — the latter her entire property. She fur- 


156 THE WIDOW OF ANNANDALE, 

ther said, that she had, immediately on the receipt 
of this wrong, gone to his majesty's warden of the 
Western Marches, Sir John Charters, of Amisfield, 
informing him of all that had befallen ; feeling 
not only sure that he would succour her against 
the common enemy of the country, as an act of 
friendly justice, but that he would readily pro- 
ceed to take vengeance on the invaders, as a duty 
which he, the warden, owed to the king his 
master, in fulfilment of his office. The party, at 
the moment of her application, was still ravaging 
the district only a few miles from Amisfield ; and 
she had urged him to go in quest of the depre- 
dators, and dispossess them of their foully gotteA 
booty. 

Sir John, howbeit, was not a trustworthy ser- 
vant. Instead of protecting James's lands from 
herriment, and James's people from insult, he 
preferred the luxury and ease of banqueting 
merrily within his castle walls. Sir John treated 
the widow with contempt ; he jeered at her losses ; 
laughed at her complaint ; and rudely dismissed 
her from his presence. 

When these things had been laid before the 
king, the fire of honest anger arose within his 
b#6om. He comforted her by saying, that he 
would shortly be in Annandale ; that he would 
not forget her evil usage ; that he would get 
justice done to her ; and moreover, that justice 


SIR J. CHARTERS, AND THE KINO. 157 

should also be done to this traitorous warden, who 
cared not to do his duty either to his country or 
to his liege. 

With a light heart the gudewife returned home 
to abide James's coming into those parts. 

A short time after he proceeded thitherward. 

On arriving at the head of Nithsdale, he left 
the greater number of his retainers behind him, 
and secretly advanced to the village of Duncow: 
ohere, again, he assumed a more perfect disguise, 
for the purpose of better achieving his meritable 
design. He dismissed all his attendants saving 
only two or three, and dressing himself in a 
foreign habit, he directed his. way immediately 
to the castle of Amisfield, the residence of the 
warden. Whdn he came to the small brook that 
ran hard by the building, he advanced entirely 
alone right up to Amisfield gate. 

On seeing the porter, he addressed him with 
some urgency of manner, requesting him to go 
to Sir John Charters, and say that the English 
had crossed the Debateable Land with no friendly 
intention, and that if the loyal warden and pro- 
tector of King James's Marches would repel these 
bloody heralds of slaughter, he must at once up 
and be doing. 

The porter, knowing his master's humour, de- 
clared to the* stranger, that he was passing loth 
to disturb him; but this reluctance was speedily 


158 THE WIDOW OF ANNAN DALE, 

oyer-ruled when the king put a silver groat into 
his hand — and so he went. 

In a few minutes he returned, saying that Sir 
John had just sat down to dinner, and that for- 
sooth he would not be interrupted. 

This indifference about protecting the land from 
invaders, was no great proof of devotion to his 
country and prince ; and to make this essay, had 
now indeed been the monarch's scheme. 

This time he bribed the porter with two groats,* 
desiring him to go once more to his master, and 
to say, that the general safety of the country 
depended on his directly firing the beacons, alarm- 
ing the neighbourhood, and assembling his rental- 
lers. 

The- knight, upon this second" message, flew 
into a great rage, and threatened to punish the 
troublesome messenger for his temerity, if he 
did Hot leave the castle gate and depart. 

But James had not yet done. He sought out 
another servant, (for the first was* too terrified to 
go of any more errands,) and him he induced, 
through the potency of gold, to proceed to the 
banquet hall, and tell the Warden that the gude 
man of Ballengeigh had been waiting a long space 
at his gate for admittance, but in vain. 

During the interval of the transmission of this 
message, he threw off his rude attire that covered 
and concealed the rich vestments of the king 6f 


SIR J. CHARTERS, AND THE KING. 159 

Scotland, and sounded a shrill blast on his bugle 
horn, as a signal for his attendants to come up. 

This act is celebrated in the ballad of the 
Jollie Beggar^ a ballad of his own writing. 

" He tuke a horn frae his side, and blew baith loud and shrill, 
And four-aftd-twenty belted knights came skipping o'er the 
hill." 

We are assured that Sir John Charters was 
no stranger to the title of the " gude man of Bal- 
lengcigh," and that* as soon as this third mission 
had been taken to him, he fell into a sore per- 
plexity and a most piteous troublement. He felt 
like one who had suddenly put himself into infinite 
jeopardy ; — not through weakness or frailty or 
misfortune, which might be excused, but through 
a dereliction of duty and an act of absolute trea- 
son. And his king too, was actually at the gate, 
and had been witness to it all ! 

There was no alternative; he could not shun 
James's presence. With a guilty conscience, a 
cowed aspect, and a faltering step, he came out 
to the barbican. 

The high-spirited and offended king now sharp- 
ly reprimanded him for his criminal abuse. of the 
important trust that had been committed to his 
charge and fidelity ; and bringing tQ his recollec- 
tion the case of the poor widow, he commanded 
him to indemnify her tenfold for her loss — aye 
tenfold. He further added, that if her son were 


160 THE WIDOW OF ANN AND ALE. 

not ransomed within less than a fortnight, he, the 
offending warden, should assuredly be hung up 
by the neck. 

This public servant was not immediately dis- 
possessed of his office ; but as a farther token of the 
royal displeasance, James punished Sir John in a 
way which proved severe, but at the same time 
carried along with it a ludicrous idea. He ruined 
the knight whilst he conferred an honour upon 
' him. He billeted his retimie consisting, of two 

thousand barons and feudatories, upon him, 
obliging him to maintain them during the whole 
of his sojourn in Annandale. The expenses which 
this honour brought upon him were so ruinous, 
that the Amisfield family are. said never to have 
extricated themselves out of their encumbrance. 


JOHN ARMSTRONG. 161 


CHAPTER XIII. 

History of John Armstrong, the famous Border Outlaw. 


John Armstrong was John strong i'th* arm, 

And lived upon the borders ; 
It seems he thought there was no harm 

In stirring up disorders. 

The Debateable Land and a great part of 
Liddesdale constituted the ancient territories per- 
taining to the powerful clan of the Armstrongs. 
The chief was Armstrong of Mangertoun, until, at a 
later period it became what was termed a broken 
clan, or one not having any lawful head who could 
become surety for the good behaviour of all the rest. 
Johnie Armstrong* the hero of this chapter, was 
the brother of the Laird of Mangertoun, and 
dwelt in a turreted building at the Hollows, a 
few miles from Langholm. The roofless, but 
picturesque ruins of this tower are yet to be seen 
in the vale, overgrown with fern and moss, and 
surrounded by wild and delightful scenery. 
. During the greater part of the reign of James V., 
the era to which we refer, the kingdom of Scotland 
was in a most troublous state of misgovernment — 
not so much from the ignorance or deficiency of 


162 JOHN ARMSTRONG, 

the king himself, as from the ambitious and turbu- 
lent servants by whom he was encompassed. 

The dissensions prevailing amongst the nobles, 
who directed the affairs of the nation during his 
minority, began to grow to such an insufferable 
pitch, that all orders — and even disorders of men 
—became wearied and disgusted ; wherefore they 
compelled these unwise rulers to give up their 
trust, wherein they could no longer be trusted, and 
to put the reins of guidance into the hands of the 
youthful prince, who discovered at an early age a 
most, rare and vigorous intellect. 

The activity and intrepidity of James's charac- 
ter led him to embrace this proposition with great 
good will ; but on leaving Stirling, where he had 
been educated, and repairing to his capital, he 
discovered that he was to be sorely shackled in the 
exercise of the sovereign authority by four asso- 
ciates, in the persons of my Lord Hamilton, the 
Archbishop Beaton, and the Earls of Lennox and 
Angus. 

These haughty peers, much to his chagrin, 
enforced him to dismiss from his society, his 
early preceptor Sir David • Lindsay, and his much 
loved friend BeUenden, together with divers others 
toward whom they bore feelings both of jealousy 
and envy. 

Howbeit, these rapacious governors in a short- 
time clashed amongst themselves and achieved 


THE BOEDER OUTLAW. ' 163 

« 

their own ruin,— a "Spirit and practice of contention 
that ended in the ascendancy of Angus, and the 
banishment of all the others from Court. 

Tins Earl, now finding himself alone, and hold- 
ing the monarch but as a mere child, soon became 
fer too oppressive, too despotic, and too imperious 
in his deportment for endurance. The prince 
succeeded in secretly fomenting two several rebel- 
lions in his own favour ; and at last, in a moment 
of intermitted watchfulness, he contrived, in his 
fifteenth year, to break from his keepers and fly to 
the Castle of Stirling back again. 

Shutting himself up there, he sent for many of 
the chief barons of his kingdom, and laid before 
them the hateful state of subjection in which he 
had been held by Angus .and his kinsmen ; de- 
clared that now he had escaped from his tyranny, 
he would eschew it for ever: and "vowed that 
Scotlande soxdd naholdthame both." . 

There was a display of vast resolve and determi- 
nation in this ; and it is not a matter of marvel, 
that these lords, angered at the recollection of for- 
mer neglect and former wrong, Worked upon them 
by Angus, should protest violent loyalty for their 
king, and advise vengement to be done to their 
enemy. 

At their recommendation, this puissant earl and 
his kinsmen were cited to abide the issue of a 
legal trial ; but having foiled to appear to answer 


164 JOHN ARMSTRONG, 

the charges against them, the whole race of Doug- 
las was banished the realm for treason towards 
the king's majesty. 

James was now his own master— -a position in 
which all men love to stand. 

Notwithstanding his extreme youth, the acute- 
ness of his judgment, the decision of his mind, and 
the vigor of his understanding, enabled him, with- 
out the tutorage of instructors, to recover the 
country from disorder, to rescue his people. from 
oppression, and to dispense order amongst all grades 
of men. The wisdom of his measures, the firmness 
of their decision, and the promptitude* of their ex- 
ecution, rise up as a subject of just wonder, when 
we take into consideration his tender years, and 
the difficulties which he had to encounter. 

He was of opinion, that his own presence in 
various parts of the country, where the disorders 
were greatest, would serve better than, any other 
plan whatsoever, for the more speedy and decided 
administration of justice, for the apprehension of 
the vile banditti that ravaged the Border most 
especially, and for the extermination, in other dis- 
tricts, of certain bands of outlaws, plunderers, and 
such like. 

Wherefore, to this end, he now made a begin- 
ning. He did not blazon his purpose abroad ; but 
rather made it his policy to harbour, his intentions 
within his own bosom, giving out that he dearly 


t 


THE BORDER OUTLAW. 165 

loved hunting and hawking, and that for the 
better enjoyment of these sports, he would visit 
the distant wildernesses of the land. Collecting, 
then, a large body of nobles about him, together 
with their numerous vassals, he made certain pro- 
gresses into those places where the quarry might 
be most abundant. 

Of his progress into Liddesdate, we have more 
particularly to discourse on ; and the quarry on 
which he here swooped so dispiteously, was the 
evil-fitted Johnie Armstrong. 

The rapacity of this clan, and of their allies 
the Elliots, had, in time become proverbial in 
the mouths of men: "Elliots and Armstrongs," 
said they, "ride thieves all." That, however, 
they should have been thieves all, appears to have 
been a fact not very extraordinary, and Sir Wal- 
ter Scott shrewdly inquires to what family there, 
it vrould not apply : — ; " But to what Border 
family of note,' in former days," says he, «* would 
not such an adage have been equally applicable ?" 

The ruins of their numerous towers and other 
strong places of abode, are still discoverable. along 
the banks of the Liddel: but on these fastnesses 
they did not by any means rely, when danger, 
in the form of a powerful foe, might visit this 
glen. Then, indeed, they abandoned their habita- 
tions, and retired into the neighbouring morasses, 
through the intricacies of such narrow paths as 
were known only to themselves. 


166 JOHN ARMSTRONG, 

Tarras Moss, so called, is allowed to have been 
one of their chiefest places of refuge; a moss 
through which a small rivulet takes its course, and 
all around abounding in desolation and dreariment. 
Some few patches of dry and available ground 
lie scattered along its banks, and upon these the 
outlaws and their families lived in their temporary 
sheds or tents, until such time as the storm 
should be overblown. So deep is. the moss, that, 
according to an ancient warrior's very natural mode 
of admeasurement, we are told that at the era in 
question, not two spears tied together, could pierce 
through it down to the bottom. 

In a skirmish on this spot in 1588, with the 
Earl of Angus, the Armstrongs eluded every exer- 
tion of the peer against them, albeit he prided 
himself not a little in his supposed skill in hunting 
thieves ; and they succeeded in driving him off, and 
of capturing his relation, Douglas of Ively. 

But good fortune is a blessing of uncertain 
tenure, and those who feast upon it to-day, may 
perchance fast to-morrow. 

Surely Sir Robert Gary, sometime Warden of 
the West Marches, relates how he went out and 
encamped against them, and how he desisted not 
until he had done them grievous evil 

In one of their incursions, they had made pastime 
by plundering the town. of Haltwhistle, on the * 
confines of Cumberland; so that the English 


THE BORDER OUTLAW. 167 

knight sent to the king of Scotland to advertise him 
thereof, and to demand satisfaction for an outrage 
so very unwarrantable. But the king, not oyer 
proud of such subjects, would not confess them 
as his own : he said that these moss-troopers did not 
belong to him, and that if they .had offended the 
English, Sir Robert might take upon himself to 
chide them if he would. 

So much did this vow terrify the inhabitants 
of all the English towns in those parts, that the 
chief' men in them conferred together, and went 
in a body to Sir Robert Cary, Warden of the 
West Marches at this notable time, to wit, in the 
year 1598, and declared unto him, that unless 
he would assist them in some effectual mode to 
countercheck these ravagers during the summer, 
and before the dreaded winter should. arrive,.that 
they would not abide the bloody hazard of remain- 
ing in their dwellings, but would fly the country 
and seek their own safety. 

Updn this complaint, the warden called the 
country gentlemen of note to his castle, and de- 
bated with them what was best to be done in 
such a stress ; when it was unanimously agreed, 
that nothing was left but to proceed to hostile 
measures. - Their counsels further urged the war- 
den to accept of one hundred horsemen pertaining 
to the Lotfd Ewrie, in addition to his own guard 
of forty ; and as this would scantly be sufficient, 


168 JOHN ARMSTRONG, 

to petition her majesty the Queen Elizabeth, for 
one hundred more, to be sent down from London 
city to them. 

"Some of these advices were embraced and others 
eschewed ; but, as many lusty juvenals of gentle 
blood, to whom the spirit of chivalry had been 
bequeathed by their paladin fathers, flocked to 
the knight's banner, and enrolled themselves as 
volunteers, he took the 'field at the head of two 
hundred horsemen, well accoutered with halberds, 
rapiers, handguns, and petronels. 

The chief of the outlaws was ycleped Sim of 
the Whitram, an ancient man yet sturdy, who 
had five or six brawny sons, and whose Mowers 
amounted in number to more than the force of 
Sir Robert Cary himself. 

On the appointed day they marched into the 
Wastes, and were joined by the foot of Liddesdale 
above Gretna, a company composed of the gar- 
rison of Hermitage Castle in Scotland, belonging 
to King James the Sixth then reigning; for, on 
this occasion, the Scotch united with the English 
in tfce same campaign, as the Armstrongs were 
outlaws to both nations. 

This being the case, they had enough to do to 
ward off the arms of chastisement lifted against 
them by two realms at once. 

In the vicinage of Tarras Moss the English 
warden and his allies built a goodly fortilice, com- 


THE BORDER OUTLAW. 169 

passed about with lines of vallation, and mounted 
with divers smoky crackis of war : cabins wherein 
to dwell they also built, and every one brought 
his bed and his mattress to lie on*. 

Thus established, they abode patiently in the 
wilderness waiting for the enemy, from the middle 
of June until nearly the end of August in the 
aforesaid year 1598. * ' 

The outlaws, secure in the labyrinths of the 
moss, which was beset with many dangerous bogs 

e 

and marsh grounds, troubled not themselves for 
the forces of either England or Scotland, singly 
or both together : for they knew that he who 
essayed to follow them, being ignorant of "the 
safe, places to tread, would walk in the same peril 
as one walking blindfold amongst fiery plough- 
shares. 

Sir Robert Cary, in his own quaint narrative 
of this expedition, sets forth how they sent certain 
messages to him, as he lay there encamped, full 
of wit and infinite insolency; as, forsooth, that 
he (Sir Robert) was like the first puff of a haggis, 
hottest at first, when it is taken out of the pot 
and cut open ; and that they bade him stay there 
until he should cool down by the winter's snow. 
As for themselves, they said that they would tarry 
in Tarras Wood till he was wearied of lying in 
the Waste : and that when he had had his time 
out, and they no whit the worse, they would then 

VOL. I. I 


170 JOHN ARMSTRONG, 

play their parts toward him, such as» should keep 
him waking all the next winter. 

Put victories are not gained by bluster or boast, 
or any particular show of great manhood:— the 
truth of this was bewrayed by the event. 

However sure the warden felt within himself, 
that the force he had with him was fully sufficient 
to cope with his foes, he, nevertheless, declares 
that his friends in England who had not joined 
him, where somewhat less confident, and doubted 
of his success. 

He was not idle duridg the time he stayed at 
the fort ; but diligently busied both himself and 
his men in exploring all the paths that led over 
the morasses, and in casting about how to assail 
the red-shanked Scots to a vantage. 

Through the safe conduct of a muffled man, 
that is, a guide in disguise, he succeeded. in. send- 
ing a hundred and fifty horsemen thirty miles up 
the country, round the further side of the Tarras, 
with great secresy and speed : and this manoeuvre 
afterwards served him in good stead, for it effec- 
tually prevented all escape on that side, and not 
a little contributed to his victory. 

These horsemen were divided into three parts, 
and stationed at the openings of three passages 
of which the Armstrongs had thought themselves 
quite secure, as a means of retreat further into 
Scotland on the north; but so privily had this 


TBfc BORDER OUTLAW. . 171 

been done, that it was .never discovered until too 
late to disregard. 

A strong force from England now crossed over 
the Debateable Land, to join and co-operate with 
the first, the whole amounting to three hundred 
horse and one thousand foot ; and these proceeded 
to attack the Tarras on the opposite side from 
where the other ambushes lay. 

The scouts which the Armstrongs had placed 
round about on the tops of the hills to keep a 
look-out, incontinently gave the alarm. The 
English broke into the wood, and commenced the 
skirmish right hotly, so that the outlaws were 
enforced to retreat before them and leave their 
goods behind ; they, however, held themselves to 
be in no great peril, as they purposed to make 
their way to Scotlandward by the other paths. 

But, ' on- emerging from the* mouths of these, 
that they might attain to the mountains, they 
were stricken with infinite dismay when the horse- 
men started out of their concealments and set upon 
• them. 

Some fought, and some ran away into the peril- 
ous bogs,, whither Sir Robert's men durst not 
follow for fear of losing themselves and getting 
smothered in the mud; but -five of the principal 
<rf the outlaws were presently taken, amongst 
whom were two sons of Sim of Whitram. 

These offenders were taken to the fort, together 

i2 


172 JOHN ARMSTRONG, 

with a quantity of baggage, and many sheep and 
kine that had been stolen from the gentlemen dwell- 
ing in their bastle-houses in those parts. 

As these prisoners were held in great considera- 
tion amongst the outlaws, the warden was now 
enabled to bind them over securely to peaceable 
behaviour in all time coming.: and having made 
them pledge themselves by bonds,' as also many 
Scottish gentlemen of turbulent spirit, they were 
immediately restored to their liberty. 

The fort was broken up, the whole forces 
marched away, and every man betook himself 
to his own home. 

From* this narrative of Cartas Raid, so called, 
and such other matters as have appeared in this 

« 

chapter, the reader will understand how powerful 
a clan the Armstrongs were at so late a period ; 
and it was not without reason that Johnie of Gil- 
nockie was dreaded all along the border by those 
who opposed or angered him 

He levied black mail, or protection and forbear- 
ance money, upon the landowners for many miles 
round ; since they, in their desire to conciliate him 

4 

and the band of freebooters at his Command, were 
fain to submit to this tax. His fame — or, under 
correction, his notoriety — had extended itself as 
far as Newcastle, and Johnie Armstrong' was 
looked upon as the prince of moss-troopers. 

In the year 1529, James V. progressed towards 


THE BORDER OUTLAW. 173 

the Solway, with the specious design of chasing 
the red deer through the brake, but with the 
actual intention of quelling the turbulent and of 
reducing the disobedient to order. In this in- 
stance, of which we now record the facts, he made 
a-more warlike display*; and, previously to setting 
out, he secured and imprisoned divers powerful 
barons' that dwelt on the Marches, whom he sus- 
pected of countenancing the ravages of the out* 
laws, and, peradventure, of sharing the booty 
which they ofttimes took. Thus, the Earl of 
Both well of that day, was forfeited and confined 
in the castle of Edinburgh ; the Lords of Home 
and Maxwell, the Lairds of Buccleuch, Fairni- 
herst, and Johnston, were committed to ward ; 
and Cockburn of Henderland, and Adam Scott 
of Tushielaw, commonly called the King of the 
Border, were publicly executed. 

James then marched rapidly forward, at the 
head of a flying army of ten thousand men, 
through Ettrick Forest, Ewsdale, and other dis- 
tricts, dispensing admonition and correction to his 
subjects. '• 

The ttrOttptUll saith .that the king wrote a 
loving letter to Armstrong with his own hand full 
tenderly, and begged that he would come and 
speak with him ; and that after a conference held 
between his clan and the Eliots, it was unani- 
mously decided that they should present them- 


174 JOHN ARMSTRONG, 

selves before his majesty, and conduct him joyfully 
to Gilnpckie. 

They felt no fear for their safety ; first; because 
they went voluntarily of their own free will, and 
not constrainedly or culpably, as if they had been 
prisoners of war ; and, secondly, because their de- 
predations, although not sanctioned by the laws, 
had always been carried on, not against their own 
countrymen, but against the English, the ancient 
enemies of Scotland. ' 

Even the soberest of Scottish historians are at 
a loss how to justify James in the course be took 
in this affair ; as for ourselves, we will but briefly 
relate the facts, and leave the reader to exculpate 
or condemn the king, as it shall seem .'fit. 

Tradition avows that certain evil counsellors 
advised Johnie to undertake his visit, fully aware 
of the peril into which he was journeying. Be 
this as it may, he determined to go, and made 
great preparations accordingly. 

He directed that capon, rabbit, and venison, 
together with a store of plentiful hospitality, 
should be prepared at Gilnockie To'wer for a 
banquet to be set before the royal guest : and 
then, placing himself at the head of. thirty-six 
horsemen, mounted and arrayed in all the pomp 
of border chivalry, he sought the King's pre- 
sence. 

44 When he entered in before the kinge," says 


THE BORDER OUTLAW. 175 

o 

Pitscottie, "he cam verie reverentlie with xxiv* 
well-horsed able gentlmen withe him, verie richlie 
apparelled, trusting, that in respect he had cum 
to the kingis grace willinglie and voluntarilie, not 
being tain nor apprehendit be the hinge, he sould 
obtain the mair favour. 

" Bot when the kinge saw him and his men 
so gorgeous in their apparell, and so manie braw 
men under ane tirrantis commandment, thro ward- 
lie he turned about his face, and bad tak that 
tirrant out of his sight, saying, ' Quhat wants yon 
knave that a kinge sould haye ?' 

" Bot when Johne Armstrange perceaved that 

* 

the kinge kindled in ane furie against him, and 
had no hop of his lyff, notwithstanding of manie 
great and fair offeris quhelk he offered to the 
kinge, that is, that he sould sustene .himselfe with 
fortie gentlmen ever readie to awaitt upon his 
majestie's service, and never to tak a pennie of 
Scotlande nor Scottismen; secondlie, tbat {hair 
was not ane subject in Englande, duik, earle, lord, 
or baron, bot within ane certain day, he sould 
bring ony of thame to his majestie, aither quick 
oe dead ; he, seeing no hop of the kingis favour 
towards him, said verrie proudlie, 'I am bot ane 
fool to seik grace of ane gracelesse face. Bot 
had I known, syr, that ye would have takyn my 

. * Authors are not agreed as to the number of his retinue. 
Sir Walter Scott says thirty-six, as above. • 


176 • JOHN ARMSTRONG, 

lyff this daie, I sould have leived uppon the bor- 
deris in despyte of Kinge Harrie [the Eighth] 
and you baith : for I know Kinge' Harrie would 
down weigh my best hors with gold, to know 
that I war condemned to die this daie.'" 

Without a hearing, without a chance given bim 
for vindication, this chief was hurried away with 
his company, and hanged upon the living trees 
that grew thereby : 

" Quhilk," adds the historian, " monie Scottis- 
men heavilie lamented ; for he was ane doubted 
man, and als glide ane chieftaine as evir was 
uppon the borderis, aither of Scotlande or En- 
glande. And albeit he was ane lous leivand man, 
he nevir molested no Scottisman; bot His *feaid, 
that, from the Scottis border to Newcastle of 
Inglande, thair was not ane of quhatsoever estate 
bot paid to this Johne Armstrange ane tribut to 
be fre of his cumber, he was sbe doubtit in In- 
glande." 

The fate of this chief has perplexed, and in- 
deed grieved, many persons since the black day 
on which it was perpetrated, — not only Scottish- 
men, who possibly might be prejudiced in his 
favour through national affection, but also by the 
sons of other soils, who could do no other than 
decide, on the case from the facts laid before 
them. Either some false- friend treacherously 
counselled him to repair to the king's presence, 


THE BORDER OUTLAW. 177 

foreknowing the risk.; or else Johnie'd evil genius 
invisibly urged him to the step, unwittingly, un- 
consciously on his part ; or else some secret enemy 
instigated James to the act ; or else James him- 
self was in an ill humour that morning, and vented 
his spleen too precipitately on the first individual 
that came into his power; or else half-a-dozen 
other ehes — no matter.; but, certain it is, all chro- 
niclers agree that something was wrong, and that 
the course of justice in the fair investigation of 
his past life and extent of crime, was not per- 
mitted to run on as it should have done. 

The writers of that day were fond of singing 
his praises, and of bewailing his sad hap ; a proof 
that he was held in. great note whilst living, and 
grieved for when dead. 

Sir David Lindsay of the Mount, in the curious 
play published by Mr. Pinkerton from the Ban- 
natyne MS., introduces a pardoner, or knavish 
dealer in relics, who produces, among his holy 
rarities- 1 - 

" —The cordis, baith grit and lang, 
Qukilk hangit Johnie Armstrong, 

Of gude hempe, soft and sound, 
Gude haly pepil, I stand .ford, 
Wha 'ever beis hangit in fliis cord 

Neidis never to be drowned ! " 

* • 

•When he set out on his way to the king, 

together with his horsemen, the ladies waved their 

i 5 


178 JOHN ARMSTRONG, 

kerchiefs to them from their windows, #nd bid 
them a happy return. Such was the splendour 
of their appointments, that James, taking them 
for the retinue of some great ambassador, and he 
at the head of them the plenipotentiary, raised his 
bonnet at their approach, to do them courteous 
reverence ; * but when the visitor's name was 
pronounced, the king was undeceived — and so 
was John Armstrong wofully himself. 

" John wore a girdle about his middle, 
Imbroidered o'er wi' burning gold ; 
Bespangled wi' the same metal, 
^ Maist beautiful was to behold." 

» 

" There hang nine targets (tassels) at Johnnie's hat, 

And ilk ane worth three hundred pound. 1 * 

Such is the notice of his gordeous appafel in 
the ballad — a ballad that was taken down from 
the recitation of John's sixth lineal descendant, 
exactly preserved in the family as it had beefi 
composed soon after the catastrophe. 

This severe act contributed to one end at all 
events : it produced tranquillity on the borders. 
Its very severity, perhaps, was the principal reason 
why it did so do ; for it Struck an unusual panic 
into the bosoms of all the freebooters in the 
country, and terrified them into silence, when, 
perchance, a less hard doom might only have 
aroused them. . 


THE BORDER OUTLAW. 179 

44 Thereafter there was great peace and rest a 
long time," says Pitscottie in alluding to this 
transaction, "wherethrough the king had great 
profit : for he had ten thousand sheep going in the 
Ettrick forestj in keeping by Andrew Bell, who 
made the king so good count of ,them, as they had 
gone in the bounds of Fife." 

Such a mode of getting through the tedium of 
legal proceedings, obtained the proverbial phrase 
of Jeddatt Justice, winch signified trial after 
execution. On the far margin of the Atlantic 
shore, in modern times, the same thing # is ycleped 
Lynch Law, after a certain judge of that name, 
who found it the quickest way of getting through 
a press of business. A similar proverb in England, 
of the same interpretation, is Lydford Law, derived 
from Lydford, a corporation in Devonshire, where, 
it seems, the same love of expedition prevailed. 
In Wescott's History of- this county, the following 
lines occur : — 

" I oft have heard of Lydford Law, 
How in the morn they hang and draw, 
And sit in judgment after." © 

. • 

Satchells, who lived at such time when the 

Armstrongs were held* in estimation for their 

power, thus speaks of them :— 

" On that border, was the Armstrongs, able men ; 
Somewhat unruly, and verie ill to tame. 


180 JOHN ARMSTRONG, 

I wou^d have none thinke that I call them thieves, 
For if I did it would be arrant lies." 

By this he means, that they were only free- 
booters, and that the fat beeves of which they 
relieved their neighbours, were lawful prizes, 
especially as they were mostly taken from the 
English, their enemies. 

• * 

He continues : — 

• * 

" Near a border frontier, in the time of war, 

There's ne'er a man but he's a freebooter. 

* # # . * * 

" Because, to all men it may appeare, 
The freebooter he is a volunteer ; 
In the muster-rolls he has no desire to stay ; 

He lives by purchase, he gets no pay. 

* * . # * * 

" It 's most clear, a freebooter doth live in hazard's train ; 
A freebooter's a cavalier that ventures life for gaine : '• * 
But since Kinge James the Sixth to Inglande went, 
There has been no cause of grief ; 
And he that hath trangressed since then 
Is no Freebooter, but a Thief" 

This is a nice distinction between the two 
callings; the one being, according to him, just, 
fair, and honourable, whilst the other was highly- 
disreputable. 

The notion of meum *and tuum, howbeit, .of 
might over right r and the fact, that the possession 
only of a thing, — no matter how come by,— con- 
stituted a legal tenure, together with one or two 


' THE BORDER OUTLAW. 181 

other such trifling distinctions, had become so 
impressed upon the belief of these liberty boys, 
that no sense of wrong was attached to the practice 
, of a life of robbery and spoliation. By time, 
habit, necessity, . and the tutorage of their sires, 
it 'had become the essence of their creed — a part 
of their natures; and we are assured that they 
never told their beads so diligently and so earnest- 
ly, as when they were on the eve of an expedition. 
In the old drama of Sir David Lindsay, we 
perceive a notice of the long well known and 
universally admitted fact, that the inhabitants aH 
around about Gretna — of the vales of Annan, Esk, 
Sark, and divers others — were noted thieves. One 
of these offenders, having fallen into the hands of 
justice, makes the following last dying speech to 
his fellows in crime : — 

" Adew ! my bruthir Annan Thieves, 
That holpit me in my mischevis ; 
Adew ! Grossars, Nicksonis, and Bells, 
Oft have we faime owrthrench the fells : 
Adew ! Robsons, Howis, and Pylis, 
That in our craft has mony wilis : 
Littlis, Trumbells, and Armestranges ; 
Adew ; all tkeeoes that me helangis ; 
fiailowes, Erewynis, and Elvandis, • 
Speedy of flicht, and slicht of handis ; 
The Scotts of Eisdale, and the Gramis. 
I haif na time to tell your nameis." * ■ • 

• 

* Pinkeiton's Scottish Poems, vol. ii. p. 156. 


182 JOHN ARMSTRONG, 

Verily, this is a truly pathetic farewell from one 
who was making his last dying speech and confes- 
sion, even with the halter about his neck. 

Common Thift, the character in this play who 
is thus exeouted, and in whom is centred the 
attributes of. robbery, violence, and raptation,* is 
thus lamented by his brother Falset (Falsehood), 
who is also brought Qut for condign punishment— 
videlicet :— 

" Waes me for thee, gude Common Thift ! 
Was never man made more honest chift/ 

His living for to win : 
There .was not in all Liddesdaill, 
That ky mair craftily could steil, 

Whar thou hangis on that pin !" 

• 

According to Sir Walter Scott, one of the last 
Border-rievers was of this family, and lived so 
late as the beginning of. the last century. After 
having made himself dreaded over the whole coun- 
try, he at last came to an untimely, if merited, 
end. A person of large property lost twelve cows in 
one night ; and, aroused up to action by a robbery 
so heavy, he called about him a posse from round 
about Teviotdale, and succeeded in tracing the 
felons to the house of this Armstrong, commonly 
called Willie of Westburnflat, from the place of 
his residence, on the banks of Hermitage water. 
Fortunately for the pursuers, he was then asleep, 
so that he was secured, along with nine of his 
friends, without much resistance. 


THE BORDER OUTLAW. 188 

He was brought to trial at Selkirk, not accord- 
ing to jeddart-justice, which by this time had 
grown somewhat fusty and obsolete, but according 
to the more modern process of jury, counsel, 
and judge, and a verdict of guilty pronounced 
against him and his accomplices. 

When sentence was pronounced, Willie arose ; 
and, seizing the oaken chair on which he was 
placed, broke it into pieces by main strength, and 
offered it to. his companions ; declaring, that if 

« 

they would stand by him he would fight his way 
out of Selkirk with these weapons. But they 
held his hands, and besought him to let them die 
like Christians. They were accordingly executed 
in form of law. 

The people of Liddesdale' still consider the sen- 
tence as iniquitous ; and, adds Sir Walter, " per- 
haps not erroneously :" and they also aver, that 
the prosecutor never throve afterwards, but came 
to beggary and ruin with his whole family. 


184 DICK O? THE COW, 


CHAPTER XIV. 

Dick o' the Cow, and the Laird's Jock. 


This chapter tells ye how that Dick 

Was jester hy his trade ; 
And how he play'd a funny trick, 

And ran a Border Raid. 

« 

Throughout the middle ages the clans of 
Liddesdale were notorious thieves: there was not 
a beefin, steer, milch-cow, or sheep, that was 
secure from deportation. Maitland's " Complaint" 
against these depredators, begins thus :—»- 

" Of Liddisdail the commoun theifis, 
Sa peartlie steillis now and reifis, 
That nane may keip 
Horse, nolt, nor scheip, 
Nor yett dar sleip 
For their mischeifis." 

This " Complaint " goes on to enumerate a 
flagitious synopsis of the "mischeifis" to which 
the circumjacent districts were subject ; — to show 


AND THE LAIRD'S JOCK. 185 

that no man in his house was safe from assault 
at any moment, or could call his possessions his 
own, with any assurance of certainty, from one 
hour to another ; — and how those who were 
unable to beat off their sudden invaders, suffered 
robbery and spoliation as a thing of course. 

Such a systematic usage of herriment was not 
restricted to the Western Marches, but prevailed 
more or less all along the whole line of the Roman 
vallation, as is plainly shown by reference to 
divers musty parchments, on some of which there 
appear ruinous lists of damageB done with no 
sparing hand ; — of castles,* peels, strengths, and 
bastle-houses burnt or subversed, — of religious 
edifices demolished, — and of property of every 
kind carried away from the rightful owners. 

In Haynes' State Papers there is an account 
of certain of these forays, and of the ruin that 
attended them. One list of the places spoliated 
.enumerates as follows : — 

" Monasteries and Freehouses ... 7 

Castles, towers, and piles . . . 16 

Market townes 5 

Villages . ' . . . . . 243 [!] 

Mylnes 13 

Spytells and hospitals . - . 3 " 

i 

A right notable catalogue of iniquities truly ! 
In the year 1586 a bill was fouled against the 


136; DICK o'the Cow,. 

Laird's Jock and others, by the deputy of Bew- 
castle, at a warden-meeting, for four hundred head 
of cattle taken by him in open foray from the 
Drysike ; and in the year following, a complaint 
was made against this same personage, for the 
theft of fifty kine and oxen, besides furniture, to 
the amount of one hundred merks sterling. 

Sir Walter of Abbotsford tells us that the Lord 
Evers and Sir Brian Latoun, during the year 
fifteen hundred and forty-four, committed the most 
dreadful ravages, compelling most of the inhabit- 
ants, and especially the * men of Liddesdale, to 
take assurance under the king of England. 

In August this year, the baron was pleased to 
harry the whole lands belonging to Buceleuch in 
West Teviotdale, without any courtesy or consi- 
deration whatsoever toward the dwellers thereon. 
He assaulted the tower of Branxholm, and burnt 
the barnkin or outworks*: he took thirty of. the 
clan of Scott prisoners whom he found therein, 
and eight others were done to death in the affray : 
and he carried off a rich booty in horses and 
sheep. 

It is no matter of marvel that such visitations 
as this should kindle the ire of the attacked and 
injured party : even in the peaceful, orderly, and 
self-denying days of the nineteenth century, we 
could scarcely brook such treatment from our 
neighbours, but should assuredly feel a whit 


AND THE LAIRD'S JOCK., 187 

tetchey against any who should so greet us and 
our possessions. 

The same nobleman ignobly incursed soon after 
upon the lands of Kale Water, appertaining to* the 
same chieftain ; during which raid he plundered 
the fatness of the soil, evett as he had done round 
about Branxholm, and killed one score and a 
half of Scotts. The Moss Tower, an especial 
fortilice ne&r Eckford, was besieged right fiercely, 
and was u smoked very sore." 

The king of England had promised to Evers 
and Latoun a feudal grant of the country which 
they had been reducing to a desert ; upon hearing 
which, says the historian Godscroft, Archibald 
Douglas, the seventh Earl of Douglas, who was 
mightily incensed against them, because they had 
desecrated and defaced the tombs of his ancestors 
at Melrose, swore with terrible oaths that he 
would shortly write the deed of investiture upon 
their own skins, — and that, too, with steel pens 
and bloody ink. 

They again entered Scotland, the year after 
their previous misdoings, at the head of three 
thousand mercenaries, fifteen hundred English bor- 
derers, and seven hundred Scottish mosstroopers, 
mostly Armstrongs, Turnbulls, and other broken 
clans, or such as had no acknowledged chieftain; 
and in this second incursion they out-Eversed 

* 

Evers in cruelty : so that if it be conceded that 


188 DICK O* THE COW, 

the notorious thieves of Liddesdale • had won for 
themselves a name by their foal practices, there 
were those also dwelling on the south side of the 
Border, and who owned to another' king, whose 
evil name merited to be just as flagrant. They 
set fire to the Tower of Broomhouse ; and, ac- 
cording to Lesley, its lady, a noble and aged 
woman, together with all her family, were pite- 
ously consumed in the flames. 

In Murdin's State Papers, the sum total of their 
depredations, as entered in the ledger of the baron 
stands thus : — 

Towns, towers, barnekynes,paryshe churches, ) ,q 2 

bastill-houses, burned and destroyed J 

Scots skin . . ... . 403 

Prisoners taken . . . . 816 

Nolt (cattle) .... 10,386 

Shepe . . • . . 12,492 

Nags and geldings . . . 1,296 

Gayt . . . . • . 200 

Bolls of com ..... 850 

Insight gear, &c. (furniture) an incalculable quantity . 

Both Evers and Latoun were killed at the battle 
of Ancram Moor, and a stop put to their depreda- 
tions ; but in those days and in those parts, plun- 
derers arose like Hydra heads ; so that no sooner 
were some cut off, than others speedily started up 
to supply their place. 

The story of Dick o* the Cow 9 -is of a more 
peaceful and less malicious cast, because, albeit it 


AND THE LAIRD'S JOCK. 189 

was a chevisance of robbery, yet the circumstances 
attending it, and the manner of its doing, wore 
the complexion of banter and ludicrousness. 

Thomas, Lord Scroop* warden of the Western 
Marches during the last dozen years of Elizabeth's 
reign, had a jester called *Diclc o* 1 the Cow, by some 
supposed to have been the same with Ricardus 
Coldall, de Plumpton, a knight and celebrated 
warrior, but touching whose identity there appears 
to be very little in proof. This motley dresser 
and bearer of the bauble and cap-and-bells in my 
Load's castle, suffered pillage from the Armstrongs 
of Liddesdale above Gretna, who one day visited 
him tinexpectedly, as ye shall read. 

Johnie Armstrong said" to Willie, ♦as they were 
discoursing together, that as they had been long ' 
at fetid with England, and as their horses were 
getting faj; and idle in the stable, it was right and 
fitting that they should arouse themselves from 
their inactivity, and make an excursion over the 
border for pleasant pastime and peradventure for 
booty. This proposal was no sooner broached on 
one side, than it was incontinently assented to on 
the other : so they mounted their steeds and 
pricked over the plain southward. 

They .first attained to Hutton Hall, a mansion 
in those parts; and having ridden around it to 
reconnoitre, they espied nothing but six sheep 
upon a lee — a prize not worth seizing upon. '" I 


190 DICK O' THE COW, 

had rather die in England," quoth Johnie turning 
away from them, " than that six sheep should go 
to Liddesdale with me. — But who was that man/ 1 
he continued, changing the* topic, — '* we met even 
now as we came over the hill ?" 

" Oh," rejoined the other indifferently, u that 
same is an innocent fool, and they call him Dick o' 
the Cow." 

" Then™ said the first speaker, " that fool has 
three good cows of his own as any that he in 
Cumberland; and betide me life, or betide me 
death, these kine shall go to Liddesdale with me." 
. Having hastily proceeded to Dick's abode, they 
roughly battered at his walls until they had effect- 
ed a wide breach ; here they entered ; and not 
content with stealing the three devoted cows, they 
also took three coverlets from his wife's bed. 

This deed of great hardiment having been 
achieved they retraced their way homeward. 

But the next morning the jester's wife made a 

discovery of what she thought to be no jest at all ; 

wherefore she cried sorely with piteous sighs, and 

filled the empty house with lamentings shrill and 

•long-continued. 

" Nay, hold your tongue, gudewife," said he, 
" and do not let me hear more of this ; for you 
may believe me in sooth, that for every cow that 
you have lost, I will bring you three." And with 
these words he hied him away to the Lord Scroop, 


AND THE LAIRD'S JOCK. 191 

and told him how the thieves of Liddesdale had 
been to his house last night, and had robbed him 
without provocation, and ended by asking his 
master's permission to return like for like, and go 
and rob there. 

After some chaffering betwixt them, the warden 
granted him leave to herry his foes, if he would 
promise to rob no one but those who had robbed 
him. 

" There is my troth and my right hand," cried 
Dick : " my head shall hang on the hairibee, and 
I will never cross Carlisle sands again if I steal 

« 

from any man that has not stolen from me." 

He now bought a bridle and a new pair of spurs 
which he carefully concealed inside the legs of his 
breeches — for they were not intended to be used 
during his progress into Scotland, but rather 
daring his progress home again. He merrily' 
mounted his beast, spurred her over the Moss of 
Sdway, through the domains of the present 
Gretna, then a barren waste covered with furze 
and heath, and so on till he came to Pudding-burn 
House, a place of strength held by the Armstrongs, 
and in which he found no less than thirty-three 
there assembled. 

" Who is this comes here ? w quoth one of the 
thieves. u Yet he. is but an innocent fool, and 
we are three-and-thirty strong." 

But the. innocent fool walked boldly up to the 


192 DICK O" THE COW, 

head of the board, courteously greeting the moss- 
troopers in these words ; — " Good den, my good 
Laird's Jock : but the devil bless all your company ! 
Johnie Armstrong and his billie Willie came to 
my house last night and stole three cows." 

" Ha ! " exclaimed the accused Johnie in 
anger, " we will hang this knave up by the neck 
that dares to beard us in our own hall." 

" Yea," said Willie, the other culprit, " we 
will Forthwith make worms 1 meat of him." 

" Na," interposed another clansman, " we will 
rather give him a sound cudgelling with the pom- 
mel of a Jeddart-staff, and then turn.him out." 

" Rest you merry," cried the Laird's Jock, who 
is said to have been the best fellow of the com- 
pany, " Sit down awhile, Dickie—r-make yourself 
well at ease — and I will give you a dainty morsel 
of your own cow to eat." 

But this was a jest which the professional Jester 
could not swallow ; so he withdrew in high dud- 
geon to a neighbouring peat-house, where he 
designed to sleep off his anger. 

We are assured that the only orison that he 
prayed as he lay there was, — " I wish I had 
amends for my three good kine." 

It was the custom of Pudding-burn House and 
at Mangerton, two principal. seats* pertaining to 
chiefs of this clan, not to wait dinner for anybody, 
— a proper custom enough, and one which is riow- 


AND THE LAIRD'S JOCK. 193 

a^days found to prevail amongst some few modern 
dinner-givers — but only amongst some few. It 
was also the custom, that if the company did not 
punctually attend to the first call, and assemble 
immediately, no second summons was given ; those 
who lost no time in sitting down to the table had 
their meal, but those who were unpunctual, were 
enforced to go hungry, and tarry several hours 
until the next meal was served. This latter 
custom has emigrated to the United States of 
America. 

Such a practice served to make every one alert 
so soon as the welcome subpoena was issued ; apd 
on the occasion of which we speak, the hungry 
horse-boy was no sooner called than he forthwith 
threw the key " abune the door-head," in his 
eagerness and precipitation, and hastened to de- 
vour his vivers. 

This action was not lost upon Dick o* the Cow, 
who witnessed it as he lay in the peat-house ; for 
it secured him an entrie into the stable amongst 
all the mettlesome steeds of his foe. So he whis- 
pered in his sleeve,—" There will be a booty for 

***** *> 
me. 

When the fitting time of night arrived he re- 
paired thither; he found the stalls occupied by 
thirty-three noble beasts, that, bad heretofore 
borne their masters in many a' foray and many 
a border raid. Thirty of them he " tied with St. 

VOL. I. K 


194 DICK O' THE COW, 

Mary's knot,"— that is, he ham-strong them;— 
a cruel alternative certainly, but the one he was 
necessitated to resort to, in order that he might 
effectually prevent pursuit. 

This done, he drew forth the new spurs and 
bridle from their concealments within the recesses 
of his unmentionables, and tethering two out of 
the three . sound horses, he speedily rode off as 
invisibly as the north wind that hurries across the 
heath at night, and passed like a will-o'-the-wisp 
over the bogs of the Tarras. The single unin- 
jured animal that he left behind, seems to have 
belonged to the Laird's Jock — that same "best 
fellow in all the company," who had interposed 
in his behalf on his arrival ; and out of a grateful 
remembrance of this friendly act, he had con- 
sideration for his horse. There was honour amidst 
thieves in those days. 

Now then did the modest goddess Aurora start 
up from the bed of Tethys, and blush rosy red as 
she raised her countenance above the eastern hills ; 
and now did the thirty-three marchmen of Pud- 
ding-burn House start up from their beds also: 
but it is likely that they did not blush for shame 
when they raised their countenances and looked 
round upon each other. 

A vehement burst of execration simultaneously 
emanated from every throat when the state .of 
affairs in the stable became known ; they roared 


AND THE LAIRD'S JOCK. 195 

like the artillery of heaven, and they swore till 
the oak pannels of the hall cracked and split to 
pieces with the electrifying oaths; they threatened 
indiscriminate destruction to all whom it might 
concern, and they raved like men who were de- 
vising the quickest means pf annihilating the 
whole earth, and all the planets that wait dute- 
ously upon the sun. The Laird's Jock declared 
that Dick was the offender ; and, calling for his 
bay, he mounted to the pursuit, at the same time 
saying, that he would either fetch him back, or 
else slay him upon the moor. Expecting a stout 
resistance from the jester, he harnessed himself * 
in a quilted jack or doublet, a steel cap, and a 
long two-handed sword. 

By dint of rowel ajid switch, he succeeded in 
coming up with Dick on Connobie Lee, a rising 
ground on the outskirts of Liddesdale. 

"Abide, abide, thou traitor thief !" cried he, 
both loud and hoarse ; " turn and stand, for the 
day is come wherein thou must die." 

But the fugitive looked back over his left 
shoulder without slacking his pace, and coolly 
inquired, " Whether he had any company besides 
himself." 

Still coursing on, now nearly side by side, he 
again addressed his pursuer, not at all convinced 
of the justice of being called a traitor thief. 

u There is a preacher in our chapel," continued 

k 2 


196 DICK O* THE COW, 

he, "that preaches both night and day to the 
sinners within the penfold of his cure ; and there 
is ne'er a word that I mark, but especially three : 
" The first is Faith ; the second Conscience ; and 
the third, Never let a traitor escape. But Johnie 
Armstrong, what fetfth and conscience was thine, 
when thou didst foully steal my three kine ? And 
then, forsooth, when thou hadst done me this 
wrong, thou wert not content till thou hadst made 
thy confrere pilfer the three coverlets from my 
wife's bed!" 

Stung by this just reproach, and albeit inwardly 
guilty, yet not one whit penitent, he savagely 
raised his weapon, and aimed a deadly thrust at 
the speaker; but the powers above so directed 
his wicked hand, in such sort, that he only pierced 
a hole through Dickie's jerkin. A flying skirmish 
succeeded to this rough greeting, both parties 
striving hard for the mastery, whilst their horses 
still held on at full speed. The -Englishman at 
last succeeded in hitting the Scot an ugly blow 
under one of the eyes, which felled him to the 
ground, stunned, but not killed. 

"Cramercy!" cried the victor; "I had only 
two horses to carry home, but now of a truth I 
shall be able to take three !" 

He disencumbered the conquered of his steel 
cap, doublet, and long sword, according to the 
usages »of chivalry ; observing to the prostrate 


AND THE LAIRD'S JOCK. 197 

moss-trooper, that he would inform his master* 
Lord Scroop, that he had seen Johnie Armstrong 
daring his visit into Scotland. And with that he 
departed into Cumberland. 

When the other came to his senses and found 
himself alone and disarrayed of arms, his rage and 
his shame were neither of them small ; he picked 
himself up as best he could, swearing that " he 
never would fight with a fool again." 

Dick o* 1 the Cow hastened to his lord, and 
shewed him the spoil ; but the brow of the War- 
den darkened, and he declared that he would 
not dine until he had seen his vassal hung up by 
the neck ; for he could not believe that so con- 
siderable a personage as Johnie Armstrong, from 
whom the jester had taken the horses, could have 
robbed Dick of his cows. 

" Indeed I wot ye lie, my Lord, to say I have 
stolen from him that stole not from me;" a 
freedom of speech only warranted by the office of 
warden-court fool which he held. 

After a fuller and more minute explanation of 
the circumstances of the exploit, the Lord Scroop 
became more convinced and pacified. " If," said 
he, " that be true what you tell me, (and I think 
you dare not tell a lie,) I will give you fifteen 
pounds for Jock's horse; and besides which, I 
will give you one of my best milch cows, to main- 
tain your wife and three children ; and I think 


198 DICK O* THE COW, 

that will be an equivalent for any two that yon 
have lost." 

" Na," returned the other, shaking his head ; 
"do you think to make a fool of me? I will 
either have twenty pounds in good lawful money, 
or I will take him to Morton fair, and stand the 
hazard of a chance sale." 

And to this demand the nobleman was enforced 
to submit : so he handed over the twenty pounds 
and the cow. 

Soon afterwards, as Dickie was riding through 
the streets of Carlisle, (on whose wall the sun 
shines bright,) he encountered the bailiff, Glozen- 
burrie, the Warden's brother. 

" Welcome my brother's fool ! " quoth the 
latter. " Where didst thou get that bonny horse? 
Did he not belong to Johme Armstrong ? Where 
didst thou get him but steal him I trow ? But 
hark'e, Sir Fool, — wilt thou sell him to me ?" 

" Ay," was the dry answer, " if thou wilt count 
me the money down in my lap ; for I never will 
trust thee for a penny." 

Thence ensued some chaffering about the price ; 
the bailiff wanting to get the animal for ten pounds, 
but the jester, with terms little respectful, re- 
solutely fixing it at double the sum, together with 
another cow. And in the end he triumphed, 'for 
the bailiff was compelled to submit to the same 
terms as the Lord Scroop had done before. 


AND THE LAIRD'S JOCK. 199 

• 

Dick was in high glee at this success, for it 
appears that he had still retained the best horse 
of the three for his own use. He hastened home 
to his wife and instantly gave her forty pounds 
for the three old coverlets : he gave her the two 
cows, observing that they were better worth than 
the three they had lost : and then he shewed her 
the brawny horse, assuring her that it was quite 
stout enough to carry them both. 

Fearing, however, the vengeance of the Arm- 
strongs, he shortly after removed his habitation to 
Burgh, under Stanemuir. 


200 THE BLIND HARPER 


CHAPTER XV. 


Feat of the Blind Harper of Lochmaben. 


The Harper of Lochmaben town 

Goes harping at Carlisle : 
He steals the Warden's Wanton Brown 

With cunning craft and guile. 

The noble castle of Lochmaben is based on a 
peninsula, which projects into one of the four 
lakes that lie contiguous to each other in these 
parts. In former days it was the abode of Robert 
Bruce, when he was Lord of Annandale above 
Gretna. Four indifferent villages lie round about 
the fortress, called " The Four Towns of Loch- 
maben." The present inhabitants of these, are 
said to be the descendants of Brace's feudal 
vassals and retainers, whom he located severally 
on small portions of land, in reward of their faith- 
ful services done for him in certain hazardous 
achievements. 


nm^^^^mmmFmmar^acimmmmmm^mmmm* 


OF LOCHMABBN. 201 

Here, long ago, lived a harper, the, last of his 
race, for harps in those parts were going out of 
fashion, to make way for that ever-out-of-time 
instrument the bag-pipe. And this harper was 
blind, and many called him silly ; but that was a 
mistake — he was no fool. 

The borderers on both sides of the Debateable 
Land having, from remote, times, kept up a 
regular system of depredation and reprisal towards 
each other, held it a meritorious sort of thing 
if any one could succeed in injuring the enemy, 
either by the capture or destruction of any indi- 
vidual by stratagem or combat, or else by the 
theft and deportation of their cattle, or other 
moveable property. 

These aggressions, practised on each other, too, 
were suddenly undertaken without any immediately 
preceding provocation. The other nation, no 
matter which, lying on the other side of the 
border, being considered hostile, as forsooth it 
generally was, lay open to attack* at any moment 
whensoever it might be most convenient for the 
offensive party : and that offensive party might 
be Southrons, prowling northward with evil intent ; 
or it might, on the other hand, be rough-footed 
Picts coming south with purposes equally bad. 

The case of which we are about to speak was 
of the latter : but the blind harper went to practise 
cunning ; and, eschewing all violence, to try and 

K 5 


202 THE BLIND HARPER 

pilfer his entertainers, who were listening en- 
raptured to his dulcet tones. His plan was, to 
steal a certain steed belonging to the Lord Warden 
of the Western Marches, who, at that time, was 
dwelling in the Castle of Carlisle : and to this end 
he determined to follow the example of Alfred the 
Saxon, and Anlaff the Dane, who severally entered 
into the presence of those on whom they had evil 
designs, and by the sonnd of their music, turned 
their hosts' suspicions aside from' the true motive 
of their visits. 

Wherefore, the blind harper of Lochmaben, like 
a good husband as he was, first went to his wife, 
and in terms somewhat darksome, discoursed to 
her of the journey that he had in contemplation. 

But the harper himself was duly seized of a 
gude gray mare, together with a foal — a circum- 
stance of which his wife reminded him, at the 
same time adding, that if he purposed a journey to 
England, he had better mount on the said mare, 
but leave the foal at home with her. 

The harper mounted his gude gray mare, and 
started for Carlisle city with every possible expedi- 
tion : he went right through the parish of Gretna, 
and crossed the river Sark, near where it falls into 
the Firth, about the place where the stone bridge 
stands : he did not go much lower down, because 
the water is there too deep and not fordable. He 
then sped over Solway Moss ; and having crossed 




OF LOCHMABEN. 203 

the Debateable Land, which, as we have before 
said, was not worth debating about, he came to 
the marshy mouths of the rivers Eden, Petteril, 
and Caude ; these he waded through, and in time 
came in view of the castle. * 

He made right on for the drawbridge with all 
confidence ; and to say the truth, he received that 
encouragement which was due to his estate, and 
for which he looked ; harpers, minstrels, jocu- 
lators, japers, or any of that tribe being ever 
right welcome in the halls of the ignorant nobles, 
who, unable to read or write, dearly loved pastime 
and good company. 

On arriving at the gate, he met the Lord 
Warden himself, who incontinently cried, " Come 
into my hall thou silly blind harper, and let me 
hear of thy harping ;" an invitation to which the 
new comer did not definitively reply, but expressed 
a wish that his mare might be led to some, stable 
and cared for. 

This was readily assented to ; the baron looked 
over his left shoulder, and calling to his groom, 
charged him to perform this hostlike duty, and 
moreover, to tie the mare beside his " Wanton 
Brown," — apparently the favourite horse of the 
stud. 

This done, he repaired to the hall, wherein was 
assembled a right fair company of nobles, to whom 
he played and sang his best; and so delighted 


204 THE BLIND HARPER 

were they at the pastime, that they all started 
from their seats and " footed the floor " with 
goodly gree. 

The groom also, in his haste to enjoy the sport, 
quite forgot to secure the stable-door ;— an omis- 
sion that helped out the completion of the harper's 
design not a little. 

Now when he had sung and played all the 
nobles to sleep, it should appear by the legend, 
that he himself, was still wide awake, albeit he 
could not see ; for, notwithstanding that blind 
people do not see any more when they are awake 
than others do when they shut their eyes and 
doze, still they have, in common with those others 
both their waking moments and their sleeping 
moments. When they sleep, an it be that they 
do not shut out a view of the world around them, 
or do not darken their eyes by closing them, since 
they were dark before, they at all events " steep 
their senses in forgetfulness/' 

So, the blind harper, not having steeped his 
senses in anything of the sort, now prepared to 
compass the main object of his visit into English 
ground, even whilst the. wits of- his entertainers 
were macerating. 

He put the shoes from off his feet, that the 
sound of his footsteps might not pierce the hollows 
of their ears, and then softly crept down stairs. 

Just fancy him at midnight, groping along in 


j» v <—^m~— w^^m*— ■ i • i in ^pajpa*>v-r*w* 


OF LOCHMABEN. 205 

the dark, through the intricate passages of a 
baronical castle belonging to an enemy ; bnt never 
mind fancies now, let us stick to the narrative 
and go on. 

He stole forwards toward the stable with such 
u a step as would ne'er wear out the everlasting 
flint ;" wary, light, deliberate; and when he felt 
that he had arrived at the door, he discovered 
to his satisfaction that indeed it was unbarred* 
How did this befall ? Why, ye remember that 
the groom, in his desire to mingle in the pastime 
in the hall, and to listen to the Gleeman's jon- 
glerie, quite forgot the door, and omitted to secure 
it. 

It was but the work of a moment, therefore, 
to push it open, and to stalk in ; and having done 
so, he discovered that the stable contained no less 
than thirty-three horses. 

The next thing was, to discover his own gray 
mare amongst them all, — a matter which he pro- 
bably achieved without much long or wearisome 
search, — at least, the ancient chroniclers of this 
exploit do not linger upon the recordation of any 
great delay, but rather seem to infer, that he pro* 
ceeded with an astonishing success. 

He found her beside the Wanton Brown, even 
as the Lord Warden had directed, even beside 
the very steed against which his purposes were 
levelled. 


206 THE BLIND HARPER 

His next operation was to take a colt halter 
from his hose— for it should appear that he had 
not quitted the republic of Lochmaben unpre- 
pared ; and this he deftly slipped over the Wan- 
ton's nose, at the same time tying the other end 
of the said halter securely to the tail of his own 
mare. Thus, they were united head to stern, 
like one vessel to another, that is towed behind 
on the water. 

He led them from the stable to the castle-gate, 
and here he set them both loose, leaving it to 
the well known discretion or wisdom of his old 
gray, as to how they should find their way home. 

Of a truth, the ballad assures us that the mare 
started off with the swiftness of an arrow from a 
Saxon bow, right away north over the flats of the 
Eden, over the Picts' wall, over the Debateable 
Land, through Gretna Green, with the rapidity 
of modern post horses that are yoked to such 
vehicles as carry run-away lovers, all over moor, 
over moss, still dragging behind her the Lord 
Warden's most especial favourite, the Wanton 
Brown. To have seen this, it would have 
been "good for sore eyes," — any eyes but the 
harper's. 

She gave no rest to the war-horse behind her ; 
she stopped not, she slackened not, she tarried 
not by the way ; but on, on, on, was her cry, even 
with the swiftness of the flying breezes. 


OF LOCHMABEN. 207 

She knew her course, and she kept it, albeit 
the night was dark and the region savage; and 
she arrived at the gate of Lochmaben a full three 
hours before daylight had begun to glare about 
over the land. 

When she got to the harper's door, she neighed 
and snorted right lustily; so that the good wife 
withinside, incontinently starting up out of her 
dreams, began to cry out with a voice passing 
loud, to the serf-maiden that dozed near at 
hand. 

" Rise up, thou lazy lass," quoth she ; " and let 
in thy master and his mare." 

At this the damsel bounced out of her com- 
fortable couch, thinking, with her mistress, that 
the harper had surely arrived. But being either 
of a timid temperament, or of a careful nature, 
or being awake to the danger and rudeness of 
the times- in which it had pleased heaven she 
should be born, she did not rashly throw open the 
door, but shrewdly looked through Hie key-hole 
to discover who was without. And much indeed 
did she marvel at what she saw, as her exclama- 
tion, which has been duly noted down by historio- 
graphers, fully proves. 

" Oh, by my sooth ! " cried she, in wonder- 
ment ; " our mare has gotten a braw brown 
foal!" 

" Hold your tongue, you silly wench," was the 


208 THE BLIND HARPER 

gude wife's prompt reply ; " the morning is but 
glancing in your eye." 

" I '11 bet my whole wages to a groat," returned 
the girl, " but he is bigger than ever our foal will 
be." 

Leaving these two gossips to clear up this 
mystery as best they may, let us return back 
again over the Border to Carlisle, and see how 
speeds the harper in the castle. 

He had sung and played the lordlings to sleep 
before he stole down stairs to the stable, as we 
have already advertised ye ; and it appears that 
he returned back into the midst of them, after 
having performed his chevisance, without so much 
as ever having been missed. 

On arousing themselves from their slumbers, 
and still finding him there, they once more cried 
out for music: nothing could they do but listen 
to him ; and he played on through the night, aye, 
even until the day-dawn began to light up the 
eastern hills'. 

Daylight often makes strange discoveries to 
many of us. In this instance, when the sun had 
mounted up into the blue heavens, and when the 
inmates of the fortress had set themselves about 
their various morning occupations, and when the 
groom, amongst others, had gone to the stable to 
look after his horses, he there made a discovery 
that the favourite barb, the most especial Wanton 


I ■■■! I ■^-^^■^^■^^^ I ■ MIM^^M^P 


OP LOCHMABEN. 209 

Brown, pertaining to the most puissant baron, the 
Lord Warden of the Western Marches, was miss- 
ing, was gone, actually gone ! Here was matter 
of marvel — here was food for speculation I 

' This, howbeit, only concerned the Lord War- 
den, They found that the blind harper's gray 
mare was missing also. On the announcement of 
this disclosure, the said harper gave vent to a most 
boisterous fit of lamentation. He wept the hour 
that ever he had left his home to come there ; he 
bewailed certain losses that he had previously 
sustained, especially the loss of a colt a short space 
before : and by way of crowning his calamities and 
succumbing him to the very dust, he now declared 
that in England they had stolen his gude gray 
mare. 

It is a curious trait in human nature, that when 
a person has sustained any great calamity, he is 
not content to bewail that calamity singly, but 
turns to, and must needs recapitulate a host of 
others that have previously happened. 

If a man by any misfare, chances to lose a thou- 
sand pounds to-day, he does not simply speak of 
this bad hap, but he taxes his speech to assure his 
friends that he lost so much money last year, or 
jteradventure that he was cheated of twice as much 
the year before. - 

In the same way, the harper not only declares 
his present bereavement, but likewise proclaims in 


210 THE BLIND HARPER 

loud accents that he had lost a colt foal in Scot- 
land not long in aforetime. 

Perhaps the recapitulation of so many disasters 
may serve to augment the magnitude of the last ; 
for it is certain, that although a man may endure to 
lose a thousand pounds to-day, still, if he had been 
losing a thousand pounds every year ever since he 
was born, he might find that the last loss would 
bring even a rich man low, and be a final clencher. 

The harper, however, received both pity and 
consolation. They laughed at him for his bewail- 
ments it is true ; but they told him to cease re- 
pining ; that they desired more of his harmony ; 
and that if he would again play to them, they 
would both indemnify him for his colt, and give 
him a far better mare than he had ever possessed 
before. 

Truly he brightened up at this : he sang his best 
lays and romances, and he drew from his harp- 
strings a burst of sweeter sounds than ever. 

Light is the heart whose desires are gratified : 
quick is the step that moves on a willing errand : 
and sweet is the labour that is done for those we 
love. Sweet also is labour, that is done for good 
pay ; and it was the anticipation of an ample, 
though unmerited reward, that brought this last 
strain so readily from the wily Scot. 

With shame be it recorded, he had never lost 
the colt at all ; only, it should seem, that by men- 


OF LOCHMABEN. 211 

tioning a former calamity, he wished to excite a 
greater degree of commiseration for the subsequent 
one. 

They paid him for this colt of which he had 
never been bereaved ; and they gave him three 
times the value of his mare, which was now com- 
fortably at home along with the Lord Warden's 
Wanton Brown. 

Having settled his affairs in this way, it is pos- 
sible that he was not long in wending back again 
over the border, through Gretna and home. 

And so much for the Blind Harper of Loch- 
maben. 


212 THE RAID OF SOLWAY MOSS. 


CHAPTER XVI. 


The Raid of Sol way Moss. 


Hear may ye read fall plain and clear, 

Without excuse or gloss, 
About the battle called whylere, 

" The Raid of Solway Moss." 

James V., as we have shewn, though ready for 
war when it should be meet, was also ever ready 
for love, when the time should serve : he suffered 
great persecution from the Douglasses for a long 
time, but triumphed over them in the end ; the 
civil wars, which this family had not a little 
fomented, had reduced the state to a pitiful con- 
dition of anarchy : but when the king succeeded 
m putting these enemies down, he turned seriously 
towards a thorough amelioration of his government. 
He was far from being deficient in parts; but 
discovered courage, acuteness, presence of mind, 
and a good ability to fulfil his high and respon- 
sible station ; yet, at the same time, it must be 


THE RAID OF SOLWAY MOSS. 213 

conceded, that his passions often drove him to 
commit vast acts of cruelty. 

A great part of his reign was troubled with the 
unchristian disputes in religion — an unmeet subject 
to breed animosity. Romanism was, perhaps, as 
tyrannical, bigoted, and intolerant in Scotland as 
in any country beneath the offended heavens. The 
king himself favoured the established church of 
papacy : not so much because in his conscience 
he believed it to be the purer, but because the 
Archbishop of St. Andrews, the Pope's represen- 
tative in his dominions, had formerly rescued him 
out of the clutches of his foes ; and the gratitude, 
which this act had created towards the individual, 
became love to the individual ; and the love to the 
individual, by a natural extension, attached itself 
to the religion, in his dominions, at the head of 
which the individual stood. 

Time and experience have proved, that persecu- 
tion rather spreads and propagates a new opinion 
than destroys it : it creates a curiosity to know 
what the new opinion can be that is so treated, — 
and this very curiosity favours its growth. Nothing 
tended to blazon all over Scotland this curiosity to 
know what Lutherism was,, so much as the burn- 
ing of Patric Hamilton, Abbot of Ferne, the first 
particularly noticeable heretic : and, so far from 
this rigour effecting the purposed end, it rather 


214 THE RAID OF SOLWAY MOSS. 

served to publish those very opinions which his 
executioners were trying to stifle. 

These ungentle thoughts were turned aside in 
the year 1537, by the marriage of the king with 
the daughter of Francis of France, and a happier 
train called up : — but his bride died a few months 
after. 

The next year James consoled his widowhood 
by espousing Mary of Guise: and, by so doing, 
greatly offended Henry VIII. of England, who 
was also a candidate for that lady's hand. Soon 
after this, certain other matters befel between the 
two other monarchs, which it was found impossi- 
ble to accommodate, wherefore they both prepared 
to decide their differences by the ultima ratio 
regum, namely, war : — Regibus hie mos est. 

Henry attacked and captured twenty Scotch 
trading vessels on the high seas, and then threaten- 
ed to revive the ancient feudal right to the sove- 
reignty of this part of the island, so strongly 
asserted by Edward I. : he complained that James 
had usurped his title of Defender of the Faith, 
to which he had added the word Christian, imply- 
ing that Henry must be an infidel ; but the Pope 
had, some time before, complimented the Scotch 
kings with that title. Henry had declared him- 
self sole monarch of Ireland at this juncture, but 
James strenuously asserted that he had at least a 
right to one half of it, for all the northern parts 


THE RAID OF SOLWAY MOSS. SI 5 

were peopled by his subjects or their offspring, and 
many of the Irish chieftains had actually come 
over and sworn fealty to him ; and such being the 
posture of affairs, and the spirit of the two kings, 
nothing was left but to fight. 

The kingdom of Scotland was now, owing to 
divers wise statutes and regulations which the 
parliament had enacted, in a happier, more for- 
midable, more enlarged, and more efficient* condi- 
tion, than it had ever before been : its armies were 
numerous, its militia well regulated, and its re- 
venues abundant ; so that victory and success were 
looked for with confidence. 

Several hostile encounters took place on the 
borders and the Merse, in most of which the 
English were either defeated or obliged to retreat ; 
and albeit some signs of disaffection had manifested 
themselves in James's soldiers, whereby they could 
not be induced at all times to draw their swords 
against the English or enter their country ; yet, 
at last, they consented to invade England by the 
western marches over the Sark and the Solway 
Moss. 

Ten thousand men were demanded for this 
purpose ; James sent them forward, purposing 
himself soon to follow. Great discontent existed 
amongst the soldiers; for, owing to the king's 
adherence to the Romish creed, which had by 
this time become unpopular throughout the king- 


216 THE RAID OF SOLWAY MOSS. 

dom, and owing to divers unwise acts which he 
had done in the cabinet, whereby he had so entirely 
estranged the affections of his nobles as to have 
lost all confidence in their fidelity, he found that 
it was not without many signs of mutiny that they 
could be brought to consent to invading England 
at his commandment. 

Disgusted at the turbulent spirit which still 
continued to dislocate the unanimity of his army, 
he sent a message when it had approached the 
Debateable Land, depriving the Lord Maxwell of 
his commission, and conferring the command on 
Oliver Sinclair, a private gentleman, who was his 
minion. 

However bad matters might have been before 
this transaction, of a truth, it must be said, that 
they were ten times worse afterwards. 

On the 23rd of November, 1542, the Scotch 
began their march at midnight ; and, having 
passed the Sark and the Esk, all the circumjacent 
villages were seen in flames by the break of day. 
Sir Thomas Wharton, the English warden of those 
marches, hastily raised a few troops, in all not 
exceeding five hundred men, and drew them up 
on an advantageous ground. 

Now then did Oliver Sinclair arise in his true 
puissance : he ordered the royal banner to be 
unfurled over his head, by way of calling respect 
and attention to his estate, and then mounting 


THE RAID OF SOLWAY MOSS. 217 

aloft on the shoulders of two tall men, so as to 
be seen of all eyes, he read aloud his commission. 

Presumptuous is the pen that tries to describe 
the scene that hereupon ensued ; wonderment, rage, 
and consternation, all burst forth like so many 
contending whirlwinds: the military beauties of 
rank and file were immediately obliterated from 
the host : and the commanders first, and then the 
soldiers, every one declared, without a dissentaneous 
voice, that they would liefer all surrender them- 
selves prisoners to their foes, than submit to the 
commandment of such a general as Sinclair. 

Everything in an instant was dissorder, tumult, 
and confusion: horse and foot, bowmen and hal- 
berdiers, hand-gunners and hagbut-men, noblemen 
and camp scullions, regulars, stragglers, hangers-on 
and country peasants, all formed one motley and 
heterogeneous comminglement. 

Some philanthropists affirm that, in the ordinary 
dealings of life with our fellow men, it is ignoble 
for one to take an undue advantage of another ; 
but in war, which at best is but a satanic game, 
this amiable principle is not always respected. 
Certain it is,. the English made no hesitation at 
taking the Scots at a disadvantage on this occasion. 
They perceived the disordered state of the ten- 
thousand, and not impossibly divined its cause, 
since their emissaries had advertised them fully of 
all circumstances touching King James's impolicy ; 

VOL. I. L 


218 THE RAID OF SOLWAY MOSS. 

and a hundred light-horse had already advanced 
to the charge. These met with but very little 
resistance, and had scarce any work to try the 
strength of their arms. The rest of the English 
now advanced : the confused Scotch, being in no 
fensible condition, and in no good mind to defend 
themselves, hastily eschewed the presence of their 
guests by having regard to what in more modern 
ages has been designated " leg bail :" and, if it 
really be, that the term itself did not then exist on 
men's tongues, this true record at least instructs 
us, that the practice in men's legs certainly did. 

To the deep thinker, and to the natural philoso- 
pher, these facts and haps are not without instruc- 
tion ; for they will induce us into the knowledge 
of certain remarkable circumstances in the phy- 
siology of the human species, amongst the chief 
of which is this, videlicet, — that valour dwells 
above the waist-band girded round the body, but 
that fear has its habitation below. For, whereas 
he who is possessed of goodly courage, a stout 
heart, and plenty of that same courage, sticks well 
to it when he meets his foe, stands upon his legs, 
and keeps them still, throwing all his strength 
vigorously into his arms with which he valiantly 
defends himself: but, on the other hand, he who 
is stricken with terror when he meets his foe, 
immediately drops his arms as of no use, and, 
speedily putting all his vigour into his legs below 
his girdle, turns about and runs for it. 


THE RAID OF SOLWAY MOSS. 219 

Sudh was the vigour of the Scots below their 
waist-bands, that they fled away over the Debate- 
able Land and Gratney like the wind, even tramp- 
ling each other under foot in their expedition ; and 
such was their perplexity, derangement, and panic, 
that they drew their claymores from their sides, 
friends madly piercing friends, and countrymen un- 
wittingly slaying countrymen with their own hands. 
Their fear was so excessive, and so helpless had they 
become through its mastery, that the very women 
and boys of the English camp came up and made 
prisoners of the soldiers without difficulty. 

Such was the Raid of Solway Moss. 

When the consummation of this untoward affair 
was reported to James, he fell into a grievous state 
of distraction ; rage against his commanders, 
who he thought had betrayed him; some severe 
stings of his own conscience, which arose upon him 
at the remembrance of many of his past follies ; 
divers cur a edaces, which had long been eating into 
his constitution ; and, finally, this shameful defeat, 
all together brought such an accumulation of woes 
upon his head at one fell swoop, that, being unable 
to endure them any longer, he died on the 14th of 
December, 1542. 

He left his infant daughter Mary, then only a 
week old, and afterwards Queen Elizabeth's victim 
at Fotheringay, sole heiress to his dominions : and 
under these circumstances, Henry VIII. strove to 

l 2 


220 THE RAID OF SOLWAY MOSS. 

unite both kingdoms together, by proposing a 
union between her and his son Edward, now five 
years of age. Albeit, from prudential motives, the 
Scotch acceded to this proposition, yet, shortly 
afterwards fresh disputes arose which prevented 
its ultimate accomplishment ; for " the Yrische 
lordes of Scotland, commonly callit the Redd- 
shanckes, and by historiographouris, Pictis," would 
not listen to anything of the sort, when they found 
themselves strong enough to resist it. 

About this time there was one John Elder, whom 
we have above quoted, somewhat of a scholar and 
much of a schemer, who busied himself and his pen 
by writing to Henry, cunningly setting forth and 
devising certain plans for effecting the wished-for 
union ; and to the influence of his arguments thus 
conveyed to the king, are ascribed those secret 
cabals, those deviseful measures, the existence of 
many unknown emissaries, who prowled over many 
parts of Scotland, and insinuated their way into 
the society of both nobles and gentles, those politi- 
cal plots, those reiterated negotiations, and those 
off-and-on stipulations, which annoyed the regency 
in Scotland for a series of years afterwards.* 

They ended in nothing, and Mary became sole 
Queen 

* See this curious letter in vol. i. of the Transactions of the 
Iona Club. 


MARY QUEEN OF SCOTS 221 


CHAPTER XVII 


Sketch of the History of Mary Queen of Scots. 


The loves and troubles of Queen Mary, 

Revealed for him that reads : 
And whether she was over chary 

In all her acts and deeds. 

With much truth has it been said, that no 
man ever read the life of Mary Queen of Scotland, 
without letting his pity for this most unfortunate 
of women overcome every other passion within his 
bosom. 

Whether the queen was really an object of vir- 
tue and innocence, let others decide as they think 
or feel : certain it is, so great is our interest in her, 
so great do we confess her misfortunes to have 
been, whether of her own making or not, and so 
unnecessarily severe do we declare her enemies to 
have been against her, that we are disposed to 
make every excuse, to catch at the smallest point 


222 SKETCH OF THE HISTORY OF 

to explain away the accusation, and willingly 
proffer our full pardon, although it may be that 
.our consciences tell us that such pardon may not 
be rigid justice. 

The condition of the nation in her time was that 
of anarchy, and distraction, and cabal : the nobles 
were looking after their own interests rather than 
after those of the state ; the clash of the too 
religions, struggling for supremacy, was breeding 
rancour between man and man ; and the machina- 
tions of France and England, jealous of each 
other's influence in Scotland, kept all three coun- 
tries not only internally divided amongst them- 
selves, but also at enmity against each other. 

Several successive kings of this northern king- 
dom met with violent deaths ; some through unfore- 
seen accident, some through irresistible misfortune, 
and some through premeditated assassination. This 
necessity, long continued, — for a regency had 
rendered the nobles powerful, turbulent, insolent, 
and ambitious; — had disrupted all order, had weak- 
ened all respect for law, and had done much 
towards creating the bands of Catereens, banditti, 
and moss-troopers, that at this period harassed the 
whole land, but especially the borders. 

Mary Stuart, sometime queen of the Scots, was 
thrice married, as has been duly set forth in the 
pages of other histories' besides this now in the 
hands of the companionable reader ; neither time 


MARY QUEEN OF SCOTS. 223 

actually married at Gretna Green, but twice 
within the confines of that kingdom of which that 
remarkable parish forms a part — an important part 
too— thus connecting her with the matter in dis- 
cussion, but especially by the progresses she made 
into this district, and so, walking as it were, 
directly into our book. 

Much of her youth wa3 spent in France, and by 
her union with Francis II. she shared with him the 
throne of that country. Educated at the court of 
her father-in-law Henry II., the natural capacities 
of her mind were drawn out under every care and 
advantage, such as the age in which she lived, 
together with her- position and rank, powerfully 
afforded ; she was instructed in the Latin tongue 
as was then the custom amongst personages of 
elevated station ; French, Spanish, and Italian, 
she spoke with fluency, grace, and precision : she 
wrought tapestry, or deftly employed her needle 
at white-seam and shell-work : poetry was her 
delight ; — " Elle composait de vers," says Bran- 
tome; " dont j'en ay veu aucun de beaux et tres. 
bien faits : " with a good eye for colour, she could 
paint with truth ; her skill in music, as displayed 
on the virginal, was the jealousy, envy, and vex- 
ation of her rival, Elizabeth of England : and 
furthermore, says one of her biographers, "she 
walked, danced, and rode with enchanting grace- 
fulness." Where, we would inquire, was ever the 


224 SKETCH OF THE HISTORY OF 

man that could forbear falling in love, that saw this 
princess ? 

The history of her loves is the history of mis- 
adventure: and yet, so fair,. so enticing, so sweet 
are the first approaches toward the rough course of 
this passion, that few enter the portal, that do not 
fight on madly to the end. 

a Alas, that love, so gentle in his view, 
Should be so tyrannous and rough in proof." 

" Libertas, career, pax, pugna, dolenda voluptas ; 
Spes-metuens, mel-fel, seria, ludus, Amor." 

Thus wrote Joannes Owenus, Cambro-Britan- 
nus ; and the old nursery verse runs to the same 
effect, — 

" Res est soliciti, plena timoris, Amor." 

If love be a thing full of solicitude and fear, 
accompanied by crosses, hopes deferred, disappoint- 
ments, and the like — all of them emotions most 
desirable to be eschewed, — surely, it cannot be 
well-advised in any to harbour so much misery in 
' his bosom ? Perchance this is true : but the 
sweetness of the beginning no one can well forego, 
though his judgment assure him that the end will 
be bitter. It is a sweet bait that entices the fish 
to gorge his own destruction. 

« 

" Principium dulce est, at finis amoris amaius: 
Lata venire Venus, tristis abire solet." 


MARY QUEEN OF SCOTS. 225 

At the death of her husband Francis, Mary 
was sorely grieved ; in so much that she took pen 
and ink, and then ponred forth her afflictions 
upon paper, — for poetry is the safety-valve to 
every confined passion at high pressure. 

Some short time afterwards she returned to her 
own kingdom ; not, howbeit, without much regret 
at leaving the country wherein she was brought 
up, and over which she had reigned Queen, 
There is a song by Beranger, purposed to express 
her feelings, as she withdrew from the coast of Nor- 
mandy ; but the French have preserved some 
lines composed by herself on that occasion — as see 
here : — 

" Adieu ! plaisant pays de France, 
ma patrie, 
La plus cherie, 
Qui a nourri ma jeune enfance : 
Adieu France ; adieu mes beaux jours, 
La nef que disjoint nos amours, 
N'a eu de moi que la moitie. 
Une part te reste ; elle est tienne : 
Je la fie a ton amiti£, 
Pour que de l'autre il te souvienne." 

For three years she governed Scotland prosper- 
ously, when it became necessary, for the peace and 
stability of her kingdom, that she should wed once 
again. Divers foreign powers had offered alliances, 
but these it was her policy to decline, seeing that 

she was heir to the crown of England, and did 

l5 


226 SKETCH OF THE HISTORY OF 

not wish to bring strangers into the land. She 
had previously, through the evil counsel of others, 
imprudently quartered the arms of England along 
with her own bearing on the Scottish shield, 
thereby not a little offending the imperious Eliza- 
beth ; as much as to say, " Look, Elizabeth ; see 
how pleasantly I am reckoning upon the posses- 
sion of your patrimony, teven before you have been 
lamentably gathered unto your fathers." 

Owing to the conflicting and contradictory testi- 
mony of her various historiographers, it is hard 
to say whether she afterwards married Darnley 
through choice, policy, or compulsion; yet, if 
there be truth in the passage here following, said 
to have been written by her own hand, surely 
the fire of love had never enkindled up her affec- 
tions towards him. 

"Lord Darnley is perpetually with me," she 
says in her letter, " and pretends to testify his 
passion by his jealousy ; and backed by that 
assuming arbitress of my fate, the English Queen, 
[for it should seem that Darnley was one of the 
lovers that Elizabeth had suggested as desirable 
for Mary,] already takes upon him the authority 
of a husband." 

It is not our province here to discuss the authen- 
ticity of the series of love letters written to the 
Earl of Bothwell by the Queen, from one of which 
the above is taken. They have been accepted 


MARY QUEEN OF SCOTS. 227 

as genuiue by many of the erudite ; and were 
discovered in " ane small gylt coffer, not fully ane 
fute lang," and u garnischit in sindrie places with 
the romaine letter P., under ane Kingis crowne," 
the F. being the initial letter of Francis. 

In another letter, found in the .same casket, 
written in 1564, we are told of another proposi- 
tion of Elizabeth's, as see: — "I am for ever 
doomed to be the vassal of the English Queen, 
the tool of her cursed policy, the property of her 
ambition, without a friend to aid ipe. She writes 
me now, that the reasons for breaking off the 
match with Darnley were, because she thinks 
Leicester more worthy of my bed and crown ! " 

Whenever her pen traced words for Bothwell, 
its point had been dipped in the honey of a 
passionate love. These letters betray that she 
desired and languished for him even before she 
had wedded her second husband; and that, to 
her second husband she never bore aught but 
repugnance, albeit some have said otherwise. 
Wherefore, there existed some cogent reason why 
she forewent the man of her election, and espoused 
another. " France, Spain, England, and Rome," 
she says, " were providing me husbands ; Murray 
was depriving me of everything but the name 
of Queen ! How, but by marriage, could I put 
a stop to the solicitations of the one side, or have 
curbed the insolence of the other? Well you 


228 SKETCH OF THE HISTORY OF 

know that it was not in my power to make choice 
of you, without I could have been content not 
onely to see my crown torn from me, but also 
resign both our lives to glut the implacable 
malice of our foes." After her unfortunate mar- 
riage, she says thus of her husband, — "I never 
loved this Darnley [this!], and his ingratitude 
has made me hate him." And elsewhere, excusing 
herself for not having wedded as her heart could 
have desired : — 6< I believe you are now perfectly 
convinced that there was an absolute necessity 
for my marriage, though the regret with which you 
behold me in another's arms, will not permit you 
to acknowledge it." She then concludes : — 
" Adieu, my dear Bothwell. I have time to add 
no more than that I am, and ever shall be, 

" Yours, M. R." 

According to her own words, in another letter, 
her choice of Darnley, who was the next heir to 
the Scottish succession, and who would have been 
declared king to her exclusion, had her father 
introduced the Salique Law as he had con- 
templated, was of a nature political and prudent 
solely. " What induced me to make choice of 
him," she says, " rather than any other, was 
because I would avoid giving any umbrage to the 
contending Princes, whose equal pretensions might 
have expected equal favours: but in this mar- 
riage, which, in the world's eye will seem wholly 


MARY. QUEEN OF SCOTS. 229 

induced by inclination, neither Rome, nor France, 
por Spain, can be disobliged ; nor can Elizabeth, 
with any show of justice, blame me ; because it 
was on her recommendation that I first listened 
to his suit ; and in preferring him to Leicester, 
I cannot but have the approbation of the whole 
judging world. Think not that it was love that 
furnished me with arguments to justify my choice ; 
for I protest by the same dread power by which 
I have so often swore, that Bothwell was the 
dearest thing on earth, that he is so, and ever will 
be so while I have life." 

The personal appearance of Henry Stuart Lord 
Darnley was comely and prepossessing : he was 
tall, well made, and handsome ; but the bounty 
of nature did not extend to his mind, since his 
understanding was narrow, his obstinacy pertina- 
cious, his ambition excessive, though not directed 
by any good principle, and he was whimsical, pas- 
sionate, and capricious. 

• The ill-fated pair were united on the 29th of 
July, 1565, and continued so until February 10th, 
1567. Some of her biographers declare, that 
"the Queen gave her husband every possible 
evidence of the most extravagant love;" but that 
it was not in humanity to cherish this love long 
towards one who, by his inordinate and base 
ambition, soon entered into a conspiracy to dethrone 
his wife, and seat himself in her place. Puffed up 


230 SKETCH OP THE HISTORY OF 

" with pride and preposterous vanity, unreasonable 
in his desires, fickle in his choice of favourites, 
and unstable in his friendships, he lost the con- 
fidence of all ranks ; he became little in the eyes 
of the people, and despised in the estimation of the 
nobles. Yet Mary, we are told, continued to love 
beyond expectation, and to endure above belief. 

But one night Darnley was blown up into the 
air: yea, after the fashion of a sky-rocket, he 
ascended through the roof of his house, up towards 
the firmament ; his body described a parabola, and 
then lighted heavily in a neighbouring field. It 
was in February — a cold night : but he lay there 
reposedly with nothing on but a light garment. 

Who shall now discover the perpetrators of so 
foul a crime P Conjecture is nothing — suspicion is 
no argument — supposition is no evidence — belief is 
no proof. Draw the curtain and hold your tongue. 

Some threw aspersion at James Hepburn, Earl 
of Bothwell, but he was afterwards declared inno- 
cent ; and many of the nobles of the realm drew 
up and signed a paper wherein they indeed pro- 
posed and recommended him as a fitting husband 
for the Queen, so soon as her twice widowed tears 
should be assuaged. If it be that the love letters 
of the gilt casket may truly be accepted for belief, 
these tears might soon dry away like a passing 
shower, leaving the sun of love to burst forth 
afterwards, and shine brightly upon Bothwell. 


MARY QUEEN OF SCOTS. 231 

But Both well had a wife — ay, verily, Both well 
was bound up in the knots of matrimony. The 
only thing left was divorce. " As for the divorce 
you write me concerning, I would not have you 
think of it as yet. The times are at present too 
much unsettled, and your wife has powerful 
friends." It was early in their correspondence 
that she wrote to him in this strain ; for the dis- 
suasion here insisted on, was not subsequently 
adhered to, as the process was drawn up, and 
Bothwell was set free. . 

It was a curious matter this divorcement — or 
rather, these divorcements, for there were two ; 
each one severally made out against the other ; 
his wife, the Lady Jane Gordon, preferring one 
against him, and he, on his part, preferring one 
against her. Her bill was founded on the charge 
of his treason, want of allegiance, and disregard of 
the oaths that he had sworn to her before the 
altar ; his, that she was his cousin, allied to him 
too nearly by blood, and within the prohibited 
degrees, as sanctioned by the Church of Rome • 
wherefore his tender conscience was but ill at ease 
under a connexion so illicit. Her suit was brought 
against him in the Court of Commissaries ; his 
against her before the Court of the Archbishop of 
St. Andrews ; and in both their union was declared 
void — thus it is, they were mutually and doubly 
divorced. 


232 MARY QUEEN OF SCOTS. 

4< The divorce," observes Buchanan, " was 
posted forward without any slackness either in 
the witnesses or in the judges. Within the space 
of ten days the matter was taken in hand, began 
and intended, joyned unto, tryed, and judged, 
before both the companies of judges." 

At this time the Earl of Both well was Warden 
of the whole Marches ; a dignity that ofttimes 
imposed- upon him certain warlike expeditions on 
the borders, as the hunting down of outlaws, the 
apprehending of thieves, or the chastisement of 
rebels. 

The earl's divorce was not merely a mensd et 
thoro, because that would not have answered his 
purpose, but altogether d vinculo matrimonii, 
whereby he was free to take the rash steps which 
verily he afterwards did take. Many there were 
of that day who cried out loud against these 
matters, as not conscientiously satisfied with that 
which the law permitted ; some objecting to the 
separation because it had not been brought about 
through the suggestions of any really good motive, 
and others spurned at the practice of divorce 
altogether. 


LOVES OF MARY AND BOTHWELL. 233 


CHAPTER XVIII. 


Loves of Mary and Bothwell. 


Some more about the Queen is said, 

And how the Earl got wounded : 
How she towards him to see him fled — 

The which she very soon did. 

Looking at matters in this position, wherein we 
find her a widow and him a bachelor— or in a 
state equivalent — it will be no disparagement to 
either if they be suffered to love. That she really 
loved Bothwell, her historiographers allow; and 
this, her letters, if genuine, manifestly prove. 
" No time is pleasing to me," she writes to him, 
" that is not spent in giving you new demonstra- 
tions of my affections : well may I err in the rules 
of goverment and state, when all my thoughts 
are taken up with love." Furthermore, this ar- 
dent liking was not a concealed flame visible only 
to themselves, but was well wot of by most per- 
sons who lived in those times, being witnesses and 


234 LOVES OF MARY AND BOTHWELL. 

gossippers of the little dalliances betwixt them. 
" If it were put to her choice," says Sir N. 
Throgmorton, " to relinquish her crown and king- 
dom, or the Lord Bothwell, she would leave her 
kingdom and dignity to go a simple damsel with 
him." 

Some time previously to this, Bothwell received 
certain hurts in a skirmish on the western borders 
near Gretna ; and during the period of his con- 
valescence, the Queen came over from Jedburgh 
to inquire into his estate, and to condole with him 
about the mishap. It happened in the valley of 
Liddesdale, and he was borne away bleeding to 
Hermitage Castle by his companions and vassals. 
The face of the country lying round about the 
Debateable Land was wild, barren, and in many 
spots marshy,— indeed, even in the present day 
it is little otherwise where this affray took place ; 
all over Solway Moss, stretching from the Sark 
nearly to the wall of Severus ; and in other dis- 
tricts bounding the Firth. The valley of Annan- 
dale presented the same features on the flat banks 
of its rivers, especially near their mouths; but 
the uplands and hills, though not cultivated as 
now, were dry, woody, and capable of being fer- 
tilized. The traces of a Roman military road 
are visible through the country; and the camps 
of Birrins in Middlebie, and on Burnswark hill, 
are entire. The castles of Comlongan and Auch- 


LOVES OP MAHY AND BOTHWELL. 235 

incass once pertained to the Murrays, lords of 
Annandale : the latter, now gone to decay, was 
the seat of the potent Thomas Randolph, regent 
of Scotland in the minority of David II. : its 
ruins cover above an acre of ground, and prove 
its former extent, strength, and magnificence. The 
stronghold of Lochmaben, near the town of An- 
nan, was built by the Bruces, after they became 
barons of this region : it was considered the key 
of the Western Marches, and consequently oft- 
times the scene of warfare. Upon the death of 
David II. it came into the power and possession 
of the same Thomas Randolph, together with 
many other fortilices here about : then to the 
Dunbars, earls of March ; then to the Douglasses ; 
then to Alexander Duke of Albany ; and, lastly, 
to the crown. As this stewartry of Annandale 
was the great thoroughfare into this part of Scot- 
land, and as therefore it was continually, in a 
barbarous age, the field of strife, it had never 
for centuries had the coulter of civilization run 
through it, seeing that it were foolish for Scotch- 
men to sow corn, when, peradventure, English- 
men might reap it with the sword blade next 
summer. Wherefore we are told that it con- 
tinued a wild heath or uncultivated common until 
the beginning of the present century, when divers 
new roads were laid down and the country en- 
closed. By this modern practice of enclosing, it 


236 LOVES OF MARY AND BOTH WELL. 

is astonishing how may fine and convenient battle- 
grounds have been destroyed : surely the English 
never mean to fight again, if we may judge by 
what they are continually doing; for he who 
destroys a place whereon to fight, has a peaceful 
disposition, in the same way that he who turns 
his sword into a domestic carving knife, never 
means to draw it again against an enemy. There 
are few open spaces now left in the kingdom 
whereon ten thousand men could quarrel conve- 
niently,— -especially if one half of them wished to 
run away without the hinderance of climbing hastily 
over hedges. 

A " Border raid " during the golden age of 
" the good old times " was the almost daily amuse- 
ment of a certain set of thieves, banditti, and 
outlaws that lurked in the fens of the Debateable 
Land; in practising the which, they plundered 
and slew at pleasure all whomsoever it might con- 
cern. My Lord Bothwell, — or, craving his for- 
giveness, the Duke of Orkney, for unto such rank 
he had now attained through courtly favour, — 
James Hepburn Duke of Orkney, was warden of 
the whole Marches on the Scottish frontier, an 
honour that called him constantly into service, 
together with a numerous train of armed followers, 
who from time to time scoured the country, and 
hunted out the evil subjects that lay hid in the 
fastnesses of the Cheviots. One day he buckled 


LOVES OF MARY AND BOTHWELL. 237 

on his armour and mounted his charger, and issued 
forth with halberdiers, hand-gunners, and bowmen, 
coursing through Liddesdale above Gretna. Here 
they came upon divers outlaws and the like, who 
opposed them sword for sword, and lance for 
lance, standing to it stoutly, and fighting with 
valour. But the Lord Warden was no recreant : 
he feared not the face of a foe, nor the glitter of 
naked steel : fierce looks daunted not his heart, 
nor did the slogan terrify his ear. He couched 
lance and charged like a hurricane ; and death 
indeed followed his course : he charged again upon 
one of the stalwart who seemed fashioned of steel 
and born from a mother of brass— one whom strokes 
could not subdue nor weapons pierce. The duke 
grappled with this stranger, and the two com- 
batants strove in each other's arms for the mastery : 
the duke essayed to bring him down, but the 
other debated hard, as one unwilling to succumb : 
and as they were bound in each other's grasp with 
the thongs of their muscular limbs, the duke re- 
ceived a piteous wound from a blade that his foe 
now drew in his stress. This was not all : — the 
mosstrooper thrust at him again and again ; so 
that the duke was sore pressed and bewildered, 
till such time as the blood gushed from his sides, 
and his followers came to the rescue. 

There are few things more sickening to the hot 
impetuosity of headlong courage in a warrior, than 


238 LOVES OF MARY AND BOTHWELL. 

the fact of feeling a long piece of cold steel rapidly 
slipping between his ribs, and rudely accosting 
the viscera that repose withinside. Independently 
of its calling up grim pictures of probable death 
before his eyes, and hereby making him reflect 
in such a manner as he never did before, it like- 
wise goes far to wither up the pride of his great 
manhood, by the bodily anguish that it sends 
through his members : — and there is no argument, 
whether wrought by philosopher or stoic, that 
could ever persuade away the smartings of bodily 
anguish. " La douleur du corps," nous dit Mons. 
le Due de la Rochefoucauld, " est le seul mal de 
la vie, que la raison ne peut guerir, ni affoiblir." 

Bothwell was borne away to his castle of Her- 
mitage, where he lay in some danger ; and the 
Queen, having been advertised of this misadven- 
ture, brought about through dutiful service, came 
over in some haste to ascertain the extent of his 
hurt. 

In her famous sonnet, which she writ to her 
lover some space after this mishap, a copy of which 
has been preserved to posterity, she thuswise al- 
ludes to it :— . 

" Puis me donna un autre dur alarme, 
Quand il versa de sang inainte dragme ; 
Dont de grief me vint laisser douleur, 
Qui m'en pensa oster la vie, et frayeur 
De perdre las ! le seul rampart qui m'arme." 


LOVES OF MARY AND BOTHWELL. 239 

Buchanan, the chronicler of notable events 
that befel in these times, and a contemporary of 
Mary, was nevertheless her majesty^ enemy: he 
may have told great truth in his writings, but 
that truth he most assuredly set forth in uncivil 
words. His narrative of this affair runs thus : 

" Within few days after, when the Queen de- 
termined to go to Jed worth," says he, "to the 
assizes to be there holden, about the beginning 
of October, Bothwell maketh his journey into 
Liddesdale. There, behaving himself neither ac- 
cording to the place whereto he was called, nor 
according to his nobility of race or estimation, 
he was wounded by a poor thief, that was himself 
ready to die, and carried into the castle called 
the Hermitage, with great uncertainty of his re- 
covery. When news hereof was brought to Broth- 
wick to the Queen, she flingeth away in haste like 
a mad woman, by great journeys in post, in the 
sharp time of winter, first to Melrose, and then 
to Jedworth. There, though she heard sure news 
of his life, yet her affection, impatient of delay, 
could not temper itself, but needs she must bewray 
her outrageous lust, and in an inconvenient time 
of year, despising all discommodities of the way 
and weather, and all dangers of thieves, she betook 
herself headlong to her journey, with such a com- 
pany as no man of any honest degree would have 
adventured his life and his goods among them. 


240 LOVES OF MARY AND BOTHWELL. 

Thence she returned again to Jedworth, and with 
most earnest care and diligence, provideth and 
prepareth all things to remove Bothwell thither.*" 

Her Majesty was no hypocrite towards her 
lover; but whatsoever «he felt, that she broached 
liberally without reserve; if she were warm, she 
told him so ; if she were anxious for his society, 
she bid him come : if he had offended her, she said 
so : and as she passionately loved him, so she 
wrote. 

" Alace ! " she writes in one of her letters, " I 
nevir dissavit any body : but I remit me altogid- 
der to your will. Send me advertisement quhat I 
sail do, and quhatsaever thing come therof, I sail 
obey yow." 

Toward the end of this epistle she excuses the 
haste and ttnmeritableness with which it had been 
done : — " Excuse my evil writing," are her words, 
" and read it twice over. Excuse the thing that 
is scribbled, for I had no paper yesterday when I 
writ that of the memorial. Remember your love, 
(that is, herself,) and write unto her, and that very 
oft. Love me as I shall do you." 

There is no dissemblance here ; and some of her 
historians have thought that she was not quite so 
coyly and reservedly spoken, as might beseem her 
estate. But ladies in those days had wider lati? 
tude of tongue, than now — the times were not so 
highly polished — society was less artificial — man- 


LOVES OP MARY AND BOTHWELL. 241 

ners were more marked for their simplicity and 
nature — so that what the bosom conceived the lips 
might freely express. Hugh Campbell, a publisher 
of some of Mary's Letters, and one of the contro- 
versialists as to their authenticity, not only excuses 
the Queen's freedom of speech, but also gives to 
every lady greater latitude in matters of love 
than in any other matters whatsoever. 

u Women in love," says he, <c are not always 
limited by the cold and frigid rules which custom 
on other occasions has imposed on their sex. 
Hence I think it within the pale of reason that 
these letters and sonnets should not be considered 
spurious, on the ground that they are not so ele- 
gant and delicate as might be expected from a 
young lady of rank in our days." 

But let us hasten to the event ; we have seen 
that Mary was now a widow, and Bothwell enfran^ 
chised by a twofold process of divorcement — a pro- 
cess that was achieved in May 1567. For several 
years past, she had been sorely troubled in church, 
state, and matrimony : cabals, leagues, plots, and 
seditious outbreaks had all in turn conspired 
against her peace, or violated her repose, or ex- 
cited her apprehension ; but now the wheel of a 
better fortune had revolved sunshine upon her 
afflictions, and dried up the damps of her oppres- 
sion. Her exultation hereat is manifestly por^ 
trayed in the passages here sequent, to wit, — 

VOL. I. M 


242 LOVES OF MARY AND BOTHWELL. 

" Fortune," she cries, " grown weary of perr 
secuting me, at length grows as extravagant in her 
blessings as she was in the former part of my life 
in her cruelty: and your divorce being looked 
upon as good as completed [in reality it was com* 
pleted at the time, but the Queen did not know 
it], Murray himself proposed you to me as an 
husband — nay seemed eager in his pressures that 
I would give him my promise that you should 
become so immediately you were in condition. 

" Scarce could I contain the joy of my exulting 
soul,— scarce keep my tongue from letting him 
know how much my heart took part in his per- 
suasions. * * * * 

" Though I know you are to be in Edinburgh in 
so short a time, I could not delay making you the 
partaker of those transports you are the author of. 
There is a delicacy in such love as mine, which 
will not suffer me to be blessed alone ; and when I 
think this happy news has reached you, I shall 
indulge myself in sympathy with those ecstacies 
which I flatter myself you will feel at the receipt 
of so unexpected an information. Make all the 
convenient speed you can to town ; I now long 
with double impatience for your presence : it is 
not Bothwell, a man whose freedom with' me love 
alone could authorize, but my intended husband 
and future king, that I shall now embrace. 

" Haste then to the arms, though ever present to 
the heart of M. R." 


LOVES OF MARY AND BOTH WELL, 243 

There is no mistake (as modern historiographers 
phrase it) about the sentiments 4 set forth in the 
above. Bothwell, thus advertised, made all due 
haste to hie away to Edinburgh : but three days 
only ere he did so, her Majesty's impatience again 
writ loving protestations unto him. 

" Oh, my Bothwell !" she exclaims toward the 
end of one of her epistles, " my heart beats high 
•with expectation, and every faculty of my soul is 
on fire with the impatient hope. 'T is but three 
days before the grande catastrophe arrives; yet 
do they seeme so manie ages ! Bee you more 
cool to attend the longed-for issue, or you will bee 
little able to carry on the charge entrusted to your 
care, and on which depends not onely our lives, 
but fortune and fame ! Indulge in secret the 
swelling rapture ; but let no outward sign of joy 
appear, till you are past prevention in the arms of 

« M. R." 
Neither is there much " mistake " about this, 
or much coy dissemblance of affection. Of a truth 
she had in aforetime suffered much persecution for 
his sake-— much anxiety lest the nation should 
oppose their union— -and infinite dissuasion from 
certain ones of her counsellors : and such is the 
inherent perversity of human' nature, and has been 
through all ages, that if there be an object which 
is hard to be obtained, or withheld from our grasp, 
that object is the thing we desire, and the one we 
most wish to possess. m 2 


i 

L 


244 LOVES OF MARY AND BOTHWELL. 

We should not conclude the narrative of the 
loves of Mary $nd Bothwell in a manner either 
just or perfect, if we omitted to give the marriage 
contracts, for there were two of them — which were 
about this time drawn up, and by the authority of 
which they were bound round with the cords of 
matrimony. The first of these twain is written 
in antiquated French ; it is taken from the Cotton 
Library, and is signed by the Queen only. It run* 
as follows : — 

" Nous Marie, par la grace de Dieu, Royne 
d'Escosse, douaryere de France, &c, promettons 
fidellement, et de bonne foy, et sans contraynte, k 
Jaques Hepburn Gonte be Boduel, de n'avoir ja- 
mays autre espoulx et mary que luy, et de le pren~ 
dre pour tel toute et quant fois qu'il m'en requerira, 
quoy que parents, amys ou autres, y soient con- 
trayres. Et puis que Dieu a pris mon feu mary 
Henry Stuart, dit Darnlay, et que par ce moin je 
sois libre, n'estant soubs obeisance de pfere, ni de 
mere, des mayntenant je proteste que, luy estant 
en mesme liberty, je seray preste, et d'accomplir 
les ceremonies dequises au marriage : que je luy 
promets devant Dieu que j'en prantz k temoig- 
nasge, et la presente, signe'e de ma mayne ; ecrit 

ce [no date.] 

" Mabie R." 

Craving the amiable reader's further indulgence 
we will also lay before him or her, a copy of the 


LOVES OF MARY AND BOTHWELL. 245 

second contract ; seeing that as we have gone thus 
far into the matter, we could scarcely come cre- 
ditably out of it, unless we furnished every infor- 
mation that is to be culled from ancient chronicles, 
or found in the archives of the curious. Where- 
fore this document here ensueth, videlicet : 

Marriage Contract. 

" At Seyton, the fifth day of April, in the year 
of God, 1567. The right excellent, right high and 
mighty Princess Mary, by the grace of God Queen 
of Scots, consideringe the place and estate wherein 
Almightie God hath constituted her Highnesse, 
and how by the decease of the Kinge her husband 
her Majestie is now destitute of a husband, livinge 
solitary in the state ofwidowhoode, in the which 
kinde of life her Majestie most willingly woulde 
continue, if the will of her realm and subjects 
would permit it. But on the other parte, consider- 
inge the inconveniences may follow, and the neces- 
sitie which the realm hath that her Majestie be 
coupled with an husband, her Highnesse hath an 
inclination to marry ; and seeinge what incommo- 
dity may come to this realm, in case her Majestie 
should joyne in marriage with any foreign prince 
of a strange nation, her Highnesse has thought 
rather to yield unto one of her own subjects; 
amongst whom, her Majestie finds none more able, 
nor endued with better qualities, than the right 


246 LOVES OF MART AND BOTHWELL. 

noble, and her dear cousin James Earl BothwelJ, 
&c. Of whose thankful and true service her 
Highnesse in all the times bye-past has had large 
proof and infallible experience. And seeinge not 
onely the same good mind constantlie persevering 
in him, but with that an inward affection and 
hearty love towards her Majestie, her Highnesse 
amongst the rest hath made her choice of him. 

" And therefore, in the presence of the eternall 
God, faithfully, and in the word of a Prince, 
by these presents takes the said James, Earl 
Both well, as her lawful husband, and promises 
and obliges her Highness that, .as soon as the pro- 
cesse of divorce intended betwixt the said Earl 
Bothwell and Dame Jane Gordon, now his pre- 
tended spouse, be ended by the order of the laws, 
her Majestie shall, God willing, thereafter shortlie 
marry, and take the said Earl to her husband, and 
compleat the band of matrimony with him in the 
face of Holy Church ; and jshall never marry any 
other husband but him onely during his lifetime. 
And as her Majestie, of her gracious humanitie 
and proper motive, without deserving of the said 
Earl, hath thus inclined her favour and affection 
towards him, he humbly and reverently acknow- 
ledging the same, according to his bounden dutie, 
and being as free and able to make promise of 
marriage, in respect of the said process of divorce 
intended for divers reasonable causes, and that the 


LOVES OF MARY AND BOTHWELL. 247 

said pretended spouse hath thereunto consented, 
he presentlie takes her Majestie as his lawful 
spouse, in the presence of God; and promises 
and obligeth him, as he will answere to God, and 
upon his fidelitie and honour, that in all diligence 
possible, he shall prosecute and set forward the 
said process of divorce already began and intended 
betwixt him and the said Dame Jane Gordon, 
his pretended spouse, unto the final end of a 
decree and declaration therein. 

"And incontinent thereafter, at her Majesty's 
good will and pleasure, and when her Highnesse 
thinks convenient, shall compleat and solemnise, in 
face of holie church,, the said band of matrimonie 
with W Majestie, and love, honour, and serve 
her Highnesse, accordinge to the place and honour 
that it hath pleased her Majestie to accept him 
unto, and never to have any other to his wife 
during her Majesty's life time. In faith and wit- 
nessing wherefore, l^er Highnesse and the said Earl 
hath subscribed this present faithful promise with 
their hands, as followeth, day, year, and place 
aforesaid, before these witnesses; George Earl 
Huntley, and Master Thomas Hepburn, Parson of 

Old Hanstock, &c. 

» 

" Sic subscribitur, Mary R. 

James, Earl Bothwell." 

They were Ynarried, gentle reader — not at 


248 LOVES OF MARY AND BOTHWELL. 

Gretna Green — albeit it was altogether a match, 
not much more discrete than many " Gretna Green 
weddings," so called ; and they lived afterwards as 
happily as many others have done, who have been 
united to each other within the boundary of that 
amorous parish. 


?) 


THE BOLD BUCCLEUCH. 849 


CHAPTER XIX. 

The Lord Scroop, and the Bold Buccleuch.— The false Sakelde 
—Willie o'Kinmont captured and rescued. 


The Bold Bucoleuch was bold forsooth — 

Which if you do not credit, 
Just read this chapter, and, in truth, 

You will 9 when you have read it. 

Spottiswood, one of the most especial historio- 
graphers of Scottish affairs in the sixteenth century, 
relates how a matter befel which well nigh put 
both kingdoms in a flame; but besides him, we 
have an old baUacf on the subject, which has been 
sung by glee-man and minstrel ever since, not only 
on the hills of Gretna, but in distant regions also ; 
— and again, besides these authorities, we have 
still another far more authentic, in a most unerring, 
tradition, which so far supersedes all other that 
we cannot now do better than found this chapter 
mainly upon it. 

The Lord Scroop, Warden of the Western 
Marches, and the great Laird of Buccleuch, 

M 5 


250 THE LORD SCROOP. • 

keeper of Liddesdale, established a truce, for the 
purpose of arranging some trifling things between 
them in an amicable manner ; and to this end they 
met, or rather their agents met, at a place ycleped 
Dayholme of Kershop, where a small brook divid- 
ed England from her northern sister, and more 
particularly the dale of Liddel from Bawcastle. 
The deputy for Queen Elizabeth's warden was 
Mr. Sakelde, or Salkeld, of a powerful family of 
Cumberland, possessing, amongst other manors, 
that of Corby, before it came into the possession of 
the Howards in the seventeenth century. When 
truce had been proclaimed by sound of trumpet, 
as the custom then was, the commissioners met in 
friendly sort, and arranged their grievance to satis- 
faction, after which they parted courteously. 

Meanwhile, howbeit, it fortuned that William 
Armstrong, commonly called Willie of Kinmont, 
who had been in the company of tlje Scots' negoti- 
ator, but against whom the English had a quarrel, as 
his good name had been sullied by sundry ancient 
depredations, was pursuing his way homeward 
alone, by the grassy margin of the river Liddel. 
The English party also wending' homeward, 
as the conference was ended, espying Willie, 
gave hue-and-cry with loud voices, and, after 
chasing him for several miles, took him prisoner 
and bore him away to Carlisle. This deed was in 
direct violation of the existing truce, which would 


KINMONt taken prisoner. 251 

not be elapsed -until sun-rising the next day. 
Wherefore Buccleuch, as guardian over.Liddesdale, 
where this matter befel, wrote certain missives 
to Sakelde, explaining of injustice ; he returned 
for answer, that forsooth he could do nothing, as 
the Lord Scroop had gone away for a short space : 
then Buccleuch sent to Scroop where he was, and 
craved that the prisoner might be enfranchised 
as he had been unlawfully taken ; and then the 
English warden replied that, verily he could not 
possibly enlarge the said prisoner without knowing 
the Queen's pleasure to that effect : then the Laird 
of Buccleuch wrote advices to good Master Bowes, 
the resident ambassador from England, who wrote 
remonstrances to the Lord Scroop, who- 1 — took no 
notice of the letter. After that, King James was 
told of the transaction, who sent to Elizabeth, 
who premised fair, but who— performed nothing. 

The Scottishmen, feeling their sacred honour 
wounded at these repeated slights and evasions, 
determined to brook them no longer; but boldly 
planned a measure to surprise Carlisle Castle and 
liberate their countryman. 

We are told, that when " the false Sakelde " 
secured Kinmont, he tied his hands behind his 
back, and guarded him fivesome on each side with 
hagbut-men, so that he should not eschew their 
vigilance and escape away of their clutches. He 
also bound his ankles together with cords under* 


£52 KINMONT TAKEN PRISONER. 

neath the body of his horse, absolutely making- 
saddle-girths of his legs, so that he not only could 
not elude his captors, but furthermore, he was 
totally unable to rise in his saddle wjien his beast 
trotted — a fact that gives one an idea of concussion 
of the brain when one thinks of it, or of a sore 
chafing of the seat, or peradyenture, owing to the 
jerking and jolting, of biting the end of one's tongue 
off, unless it were carefully kept from getting 
between the teeth. 

They then conducted him through the Liddel- 
rack, a ford on that river, over Solway Moss, the 
Debateable Land, across the sands of Carlisle that 
then spread their marishlike and quaking expanse ' 
about the mouth of the Eden ; then over the 
Sacery, or plain beneath the castle walls, whereon 
Peredur, the Prince of Sunshine, so gallantly tilted 
with the discourteous knight, and lastly mto the 
fortress, where he was delivered up to durance 
vile. 

His friends, north of Hadrian's rampire, con- 
ceived infinite indignation at what they considered 
a piece of the greatest treachery ever practised ; 
so they enterprised to achieve one of the most 
daring, and well-conducted exploits of that age. 
All the ancient chroniclers unite in lauding it in 
goodly terms. " Audax facinus cum modica 
manu, in urbe moenibus et multitudine oppida- 
norum munita, et calidse audaciae, vix ullo obsisti 


KINMONT TAKEN PRISONER. 253 

m6do potuit." — [Johnatoni IJistoricL] And Bir- 
rel, in his Diary for April 6 9 1596, say», the deed 
was done « with shouting and crying, and sonnde 
of trumpet, puttand the said toun and countrie 
in sic ane fray, that the like of sic ane wassalage 
was nevir done since the memorie of man, no not 
in Wallace dayis." 

Queen Elizabeth was not only much angered 
against her northern neighbours for their bearing 
in this affair, but she had been before exasperated 
with Buccleucji because he had retaliated against 
a party of English who had ravaged Liddesdale r 
by a counter raid into Cumberland, on which 
occasion he took six and thirty thieves, all of 
whom he did to death. Her resentment is well 
set forth in the preface of her epistle to her am- 
bassador Bowes, where she says, speaking of king 
James, — "I wonder how base-minded that king 
thinks me, that, with patience, I can digest this 
dishonourable * * * *. Let him know, therefore, 
that I will have satisfaction, or else '* * * * ." 
These broken words of ire, observes Sir Walter 
of Abbotsford, are inserted betwixt the subscrip- 
tion and the address of the letter. 

So strong was the inveteracy of feeling toward 
Buccleuch, — an* inveteracy perhaps engendered 
partly through jealousy of his bold exploits, — that 
his sordid foes, who were impotent to cope with 
him in direct fight, at one time appear to have 


254 KINMONT TAKEN PB1SONER. 

formed the design of privily assassinating him; 
a cowardly plan, which one would scarcely look 
for even -in a barbarous age, when hardy courage 
was one of the chiefest virtues, and when instances 
of rude yet praiseworthy chivalry, or .of savage 
yet honourable generosity, not infrequently oc- 
curred between hostile parties. 

When Willie o' Kinmont found himself in the 
power and iron fetters of the Lord Warden, his 
doughty spirit, which had been a part of his 
nature from his cradle upwards, .was nothing 
stricken in fear or dismay; and neither was he 
one whit cowed, though now in the presence of 
his very foe, who made no bones of death, doom- 
ing his flesh to the carrion crows. 

u Albeit my arm is tied, yet is my tongue 
free," cried he, in answer to the taunts which 
they heaped upon him.; " and who is there among 
ye that will avow this deed, or will endure the 
penalty of the Border Law now in the time of 
plighted truce ; or who among ye will dare answer 
to it in the face of my bold kinsman Buccleuch 
of Branksome ? v> 

" Hold thy tongile, thon rank rover ! " was the 
instant reply ; " prate not of thy bold kinsman, 
for there is never a Scot in the land that shall set 
thee free. Know, Sir Marchman, that ere ye 
cross the castle gate, ye shall take a lasting fare* 
well of me." 


KINMONT CONDEMNED. 255 

" Deal me death an ye will, my lord," returned 
the prisoner, " and fear ye nothing for me ; but 
by the faith o' my body I say, that I never yet 
lodged in a hostelrie, but I paid my reckoning 
Well to the contentment of mine host ere I de- 
patted away." 

" Stint your misruled taunts here, slave ! What 
ho, guards ! bear him away to the lower dungeon* 
We will see who is the true Lord of the castle !" 

And Kinmont was hurried away in despite, and 
dismally encarcered in the dank and murky prison 
of the donjon, until such time as he should be 
brought out to the hairibee, and hung up by the 
bare neck. 

But the issue of this misfare had been reported 
to Buccleuch of Branksome ; and there, as he sat 
at meat in his panneled hall, with his vassals 
about him and his villains below the salt, . he 
seized hold of the table in his agony ; he raised 
the cup, brimming with red wine, on high, and 
he swore by a terrible oath, that of a truth he 
would be avenged of the Lord Scroop for this 
deed. 

" And is my basnet but a widow's curch," cried 
he; "or my lance but the wand of a willow- 
tree, or my arm but like the lilly hand of a lady, 
that the English Warden should thus set me at 
nought? And have they really taken Kinmopt 
Willie, forgetting of the truce now betwixt us ? 


£56 buccleuch's rage. 

and have they forgotten that the bold Buccleuch 
is keeper here on the Scottish side ? And have 
they indeed taken him withouten dread of. my 
puissance, and without remembering that Buc- 
cleuch truly can back a steed and shake a spear ? 
Were there but war beftween the two lands, as 
I wot well there is not, I would bring down the 
towering battlements of Carlisle, albeit they were 
builded of marble stone ! Yea, even so would I 
set those walls in a flame, and then cool them 
again in English blood ! There 's never a man 
in Cumberland should ken where Carlisle Castle 
stood ! " 

Such was the first burst of Buccleuch's rage ; 
and he only regretted that there was no war 
between the kingdoms, because this amicable fact 
denied him the power of suffering his vengeance 
to run wild over the Border. We might suppose, 
however, that the unjust captivation of his friend, 
and the general practice of the Law of Talion, 
would have permitted him to give full liberty to 
his wrath and his drawn sword ; but, to his high 
praise be it spoken, he appears to have been a 
man of a better nature, and one who would not 
return wrong for wrong, absolutely for the sake 
of so doing, but only so far as to chastise his 
enemies as should seem* due to them. 

ki Wherefore," continued he in a milder tone, 
" since there is no strife waging between my liege 


KINMONT'S RESCUE* 257 

lord and the queens majesty of the south country, 
but rather peace as peace should be, I will hurt 
neither English lad nor lass ; — but yet, an it please 
heaven, 1 swear that Kinmont shall surely be set 
free." 

The exploit that he now undertook to achieve, 
is characterised as one of the last, and one of the 
most gallant that befel in these parts ; one of 
the last, because the most high, mighty, and 
magnificent empress, renowned for piety, virtue, 
and all gracious government, Elizabeth, by the 
Grace of God, Queen of England, France, -and 
Ireland, and of Virginia, Defender of the Faith, 
&c, was well stricken in years, and had not 
much longer to wear an earthly crown; and 
one of the most gallant, because the basement of 
the motive from which it sprung was not laid in 
the mire of an evil desire for outrage, but upon a 
philanthropic sympathy toward a kinsman, who, 
as he and they believed, had been foully dealt 
with. 

He called about him forty stalwart marchmen; 
all of his own name, saving only the knight Sir 
Gilbert Elliot, Laird of Stobs; and these assembled 
in right order for the enterprise, bravely vestured 
with spur on heel and splent on spauld, with 
glaives of green, and with feathers 6' blue. He 
marshaled them by fives, that they might proceed 
with the greater discipline and surety ; twb com- 


258 kinmont's rescue. 

panies of five each led the van, bearing bright 
bugles and hunting-horns: then came Buccleuch 
himself, flanked by five and five on either hand, 
armed at all points like Warders'* men arrayed for 
fight ; after that there were ten of them carrying" 
ladders for the purpose of scaling the walls, all of 
them wearing the semblance of half a score working 
masons ; and lastly, there came twice five, who, 
like broken men, or men of no consideration, dis- 
persed themselves about to act as discoverers 
against ambush. 

Thus they departed away from Branksome, and 
thus they attained to the Woodhouselee, a house 
on the border of Buccleucb's territory. 

Nine-and-twently knights of fame hung their 
shields in Branksome Hall ; — nine-and-twenty 
squires of name brought them their steeds from 
bower to stall ; — - nine-and-twenty yeomen tall, 
waited duteous, on them all : they were all knights 
of mettle true — kinsmen to the bold Buccleuch. 
Thus the reader will easily conceive how puissant 
a chieftain lived in this castelet, and how strong a 
consanguineous force he could back an argument 
with against his foe. 

Such was the disordered state of the times, that 
these warriors, for the most part, stood .ready bar* 
nessed in steel, or else when they lay down to 
sleep they pillowed their helmets (with their heads 
inside)' upon their cold and hard blucklers. They 


THE FALSE SAKELDE MET. 259 

sat down to the oaken table at banquet time with 
their gauntlets about their wrists; their horses 
stood ready caparisoned at need ; and a vigilant 
watch toward England was kept up at night, — such 
was the custom of Branksome Hall. But if ye be 
curious to learn more touching the customs of this 
great Bastle-house, we refer ye to the Lay that 
whilom was sung by the Last Minstrel of the clan. 
They then crossed the Debateable Land, and enter- 
ed into England, when who should be the yery first 
man they met, but the false Sakelde himself !— - 
he forsooth, that had foully taken Willie of Kin- 
mont ! Credat Lector ! — but it is recorded true in 
history — and, what is better, in tradition too* 

" Where are ye going ye keen hunters ?" said he 
to the first ten, who he perceived were* furnished 
with horns and bugles. 

" We are going to hunt an English stag," was 
the ready answer, u that has trespassed on the 
Scots' country." 

After that he perceived the next decade bear* 
ing Jedworth axes and smutty crackfe of war. 
" And where are you going ?" cried he, " come, 
tell me true, ye marshalmen ? " 

" We are going to catch a rank rover," was 
their reply, '* who has broken faith with the bold 
Buccleuch." 

Then followed the pseudo-masons bearing the 
tall scaling ladders upon their shoulders ; and these 


260 THE FALSE SAKELDE MET. 

might have readily excited his surprise. He ac- 
costed them incontinently with a similar demand, 
and they, too, were prepared for him : — 

" Where are ye going, ye mason lads, with your 
long and high ladders ? " 

" Oh," returned they, " we are going to herry 
a corbie's, nest, that rides in the wind high upon a 
tree-top not far from Woodhouselee." 

This seemed all very good and very passable ; 
and lastly, amongst the company, he encountered 
the discoverers. 

" And now, ye broken men, come tell me whi- 
ther ye are going ? " 

But here the answer was not so mysterious or 
evasive ; neither was it a blunt answer that was 
returned to him, but rather the contrary ; and if jt 
were not a blunt answer, it was peradventure a 
short one. 

The legend saith, that one Dickie of Deghope 
was the leader of this band; a man not given to 
words, and one who, nevertheless, could scarcely 
be called % peaceable man ; he was a plain blunt 
man, like Antony, having neither wit, nor words, 
nor worth, action nor utterance, nor the power of 
speech to stir men's blood with flossy declamation : 
he was no orator, as Brutus was, but only spoke 
right on ; — and in this instance he used cutting 
words indeed. 

A sudden paroxysm of choler appears to have 


THE FALSE SAKELDE KILLED. 261 

seized upon the false Sakelde against these border- 
ers ; for if his demeanour had hitherto been at all 
courteous, assuredly now, the spirit of his bearing 
had changed to rough. 

" Why trespass ye," cried he, " on the English 
side, ye raw-footed outlaws ? " 

He had better have schooled his speech to a 
inore gentle tenour •! but in a voice of thunder he 
added the single imperative word, " Stand ! " 

Now these " raw-footed outlaws," had no idea 
of listening unmoved to such terms; wherefore 
Dickie, without taxing his tongue to answer a 
syllable, forthwith ran his long lance into his body 
— aye, right through and through, in on one side 
and out at the other ! 

This chevisance having been accomplished, and 
the false Sakelde having been amply reguerdoned 
for his former misdeeds, the whole company held 
on their way for Carlisle, leaving him quiet on the 
moss, and " as dead as a nayle-doore." 

They crossed the river Eden at Staneshaw bank ; 
but the waters were high and the fords were deep, 
and wonder it was that man and horse were not 
carried away to destruction ; but praised be Ourisk 
the Bogle of the muir, the flood Kelpie Gilpin 
Horner, and the rest of that fraternity, they landed 
safe on the opposite rivage, without any loss what- 
soever. Here they took the precaution of leaving 
their steeds, and of proceeding on foot, lest they 


262 CARLISLE CASTLE SCALED. 

should stamp or neigh, and thereby betray them 
to the sentinels. The wind was blowing, and the 
surcharged clouds were weeping plenteously upon 
their heads; it was a wild and blustrous night $ 
but the hardy Scots cared little for the elements, 
so they compassed their purpose. 

When they came under the castle wall, they 
held their breath and crept stealthily upon their 
knees: they placed their ladders from the slope 
even up to the top of the battlements; and, so 
eager was Buccleuch himself, that he was the first 
to mount. On jumping upon the leads, the bold 
leader encountered the watchman : him he seized 
by the throat, and overcame with an iron-bound 
grasp, at the same time telling him that had there 
not been peace between the two kingdoms, it 
should have gone harder with him;. but now, for 
the nonce, his life was still his own. Here have 
we another mention of his clemency in sparing this 
man's life ; the Sotchman's aim not being murder 
and revengement, but the rescue of his country- 
man only. 

" Now, sound our trumpet," cried he to his 
followers, who by this time were on the leads 
around him : " now let us waken up Lord Scroop 
right merrily,? and the brazen blast tore along 
through the still passages of the fortress, and 
drummed upon the ears of the startled sleepers. 
This was speedily answered by the grating reson- 


KINMONT RESCUED. 263 

ance of the warder's horn, a sound of alarum thai 
roused every one from drowsy forgetfulnes to life, 
activity, and amazement. In a moment every 
couch was deserted— -every wight used his legs 
to fetch his arms, hastily running he scarce knew 
whither, to meet he knew not what foe. 

" Who is it that dares meddle with me ?" 
roared the Lord Scroop at the top of his voice : 
but the forty marchmen raised the slogan one and 
all, and the terror-stricken English, hardly having 
yet shaken off the remembrance of their dreams, 
believed that King James and his whole Scottish 
army were amongst them. 

Buccleuch and his men immediately cut a hole 
in the lead on the roof, and through this they let 
themselves down withinside : they first went to 
the hall bearing every obstacle before them ; and 
albeit there were a thousand warriors garrisoned 
there in the castle, such was their surprise, such 
the darkness, and such the panic, that their in- 
vaders were allowed to sweep forward like a 
torrent. With coulters taken from the plough, 
and with massy fore-hammers, they beat down 
doors, partitions, and stout bars, irresistibly break- 
ing their way onward to the inner prison. When 
they had wrenched out the bolts and the beams 
that had so strongly sealed up this dismal dungeon, 
there of a truth they discovered the wretched 
prisoner who had been adjudged to die at daylight* 


264 KINMONT RESCUED. 

• " Are you asleep, or are you awake/Willie o* 
Kinmont, now on the morning when you are 
doomed to die ?" 

" Oh !" returned he resolutely, for he thought 
it was the executioner come to lead him forth ; 
" Oh ! I sleep softly, though I wake sometimes ; 
it is a long while since my foes were able to scare 
sleep away from me. Give my service* back to 
my wife and bairns in 'Scotland, and to all the 
good fellows that ask after me — and then you shall 
see how a brave man can die on the Hairibee." 

But Willie was soon better instructed in the 
personage of his visitor, and cheerily enlightened 
as to the veritable state ofrthe matter in his favour : 
the vision of the hangman dissolved away before 
his mind when the actual form of his ancient friend 
Red Rowan stood beside him, and with his elo- 
quent tongue poured welcome news of his deliver- 
ance into his hungry ears. 

This " starkest man in Teviotdale," as the ballad 
calls him, was then hoisted up from his noisome 
cell, and was being led away in triumph towards 
the scaling ladders still leaning against the em- 
brasures of the battlements, that he might see the 
outside of the walls, whereon the sun would shine 
bright, as soon as the orb of day should climb over 
the eastern hill : but he cried out to his comrades 
to stint their haste for a space, saying, forsooth, 
that it would be an' uncourteous thing not to bid 


1 


KINMONT RESCUED. 265 

the Lord Scroop good- night, before he departed 
from his lodgings. 

This act of civility being well commended, he 
forthwith sought the presence ; and when he stood 
fronting the blustrous warden, he exclaimed, — 
" Farewell, farewell ! my gude Lord Scroop ; we 
will now part company for this present if it con- 
sort with your liking ; but believe me, I will 
bounteously pay you my rent here, the very first 
time that we meet on the other side of the border." 
And with these words he turned about and made 
for the leads. 

But the irons that had been riveted on his legs 
so hindered his walking, that Red Rowan mount- 
ed him upon his shoulders, and with a shout of 
exultation, bore him down the ladder and along 
the flats, whilst the irons clanked loudly as Rowan 
ran. o 

" Many a time," quoth Kinmont Willie, " have 
I ridden a horse ; but a rougher beast than this, 
I ween my legs never bestrode." 

No matter — on they went joyously through 
brake and through dingle, through the sedges and 
reeds that -covered the 'low grounds, and through 
the gullies and pools that lay in their rugged 
course: — "And many a time," said he again, 
" have I pricked a horse out over the furrows, but 
since the first day I backed a steed, I never yet 
wore such a cumbrous pair of spurs." 

VOL. I. N 


266 kinmont's escape. 

But the castellain, whom they had left behind, 
was not idle, nor did he purpose suffering bim to 
escape scot-free in this fashion. 

Scarcely had they attained to the Staneshaw 
bank, with" the intention of recrossing the .Eden, 
than they heard all the alarum bells of the cathe- 
dral and churches of Carlisle toll loudly to rouse 
the citizens to arms and pursuit. But, like 
Susannah, " they got the start and kept it," 
although their* pursuers were close upon their 
heels when they had proceeded thus far. On 
arriving at the margin of this stream, up came my 
Lord Scroop, backed with a thousand horse and 
foot, netted in chain mail, and tiled over with 
plates of steel, upon the polished faces of which 
the first rays of the nascent morning were begin- ' 
ing to fall. On moved the host over the heath, 
like a giant porcupjne, whose prickly back was 
bristled with pikes, halberds, and spears, pointing 
to the sky. Yet the bold Buccleuch, still keeping 
what be had before got — that is the start, — 
plunged into the swollen river, now crowned to 
the brim by. decent rains, and swam safely* over in 
the face of this army, together with the whole of 
* his company. Being on the other side, he turn- 
ed him round to his pursuer, and addressed to 
him these words 

" If ye like na my visit in merry England, in 
fair Scotland come visit me." 


THE LORD SCROOP'S ASTONISHMENT. 267 

• 

My Lord Scroop is represented as being not a 
little astonished at what he had conceived to have 
been an impossible feat in the then state of the 
torrent ; for it was on the 13th of April, immedi- 
ately lifter a vast fall of rain, such as sometimes 
comes down in the north during the early spring. 

" He stood as still as a rock of stane," marvel- 
ing at the hazardry of his foes ; and then turning 
to one that stood beside him he observed — 

" He is either himsell a devil fra hell, or else 
his mother a witch maun be ; I would na have 
ridden that wan water for all the gold in Chris- 
tentie." 

Bishop Spottiswood, to whom we have alluded 

in the beginning* of this chapter, says that the 

Scotts found their scaling ladders too short for 

mounting over the battlements ; and that they, in 

consequence, effected an entry near the postern 

door by means of crowbars, wrenching-ironjs, and 

the like,, He also says, that they amounted in all 

to two hundred horse, and not to merely forty 

diversely-attired men as above related. The 

bishop, howbeit, is only an authentic historian, 

and not deserving of any credit, whereas the other 

account is pure tradition, and poetry all written in 

verse. The courteous and most discerning reader 

may, therefore, easily judge of what is likely to be 

the real truth. 

The historian proceeds to say that — " The 

* 2 


268 ELIZABETH'S DISPLEASURE. 

Queen of England, haying notice sent her of what 
was done, stormed not a little. One of her chief 
castles surprised, a prisoner carried away, so far 
within England, she esteemed a great affront. 
The lieger, Mr. Bowes, in a frequent convention 
kept at Edinburgh, the 22nd of May, (the same 
year, 1596,) did, as he was charged, in a long ora- 
tion, aggravate the heinousness of the fact, con- 
cluding that peace* could not longer continue be- 
twixt the two . realms, unless Buccleuch were 
delivered in England, to be punished at the 
queen's pleasure. 

" Buccleuch compearing, and charged with the 
fact, made answere — ' That he went not into Eng- 
lande with intention to assault any of the queen's 
houses, or to 5I0 wrong to any of her subjects, but 
only to relieve a subject of Scotland unlawfully 
taken, and more unlawfully detained ; that, in 
the time of a general assurance, in a day of truce, 
he was taken prisoner against all order; neither 
did he attempt his reliefe till redresse was refused ; 
and that he had carried the business in such a 
moderate, manner, as no hostilitye was committed, 
nor the least wrong offered to any within the castle. 
Yet was he content, accordinge to the ancient 
treaties observed between the two realms, when as 
mutual injuries were alleged, to be tried by the 
commissioners that it should please their majesties 
to appoint, and submit himself to that which they 
should decern. 1 " 


Elizabeth's displeasure. 269 

This was considered quite satisfactory to all but 
the haughty Elizabeth. The matter was again 
negociated — put off — the Laird amused himself 
with other raids pendente lite— commissioners were 
once more appointed — James was fidgety and testy 
— Elizabeth passionate — and finally Buccleuch 
rendered himself up at Si. Andrews. He was 
afterwards conducted into England, where we con- 
clude, that the misunderstanding was adjusted 
without much difficulty ; for we . see him soon 
liberated fronrrestraint, and free to return home. 
Wherefore he directed his course northward, re- 
crossed the border, and once agsjin found himself 
the undisputed Laird of Branksome ; — and so 
ended this business. 

Although the untractable spirit of the Dales- 
men on the borders had given way in a slight 
degree to a more peaceable demeanour since James 
VI. had become James I., they still, at times, as 
the politics, or state of affairs, or contentions, in 
either or both kingdoms allowed, were ever ready 
to fall to their old practices. As both sides of the 
frontier were inhabited by a population which ac- 
knowledged themselves as subjects to the same king, 
that principle of animosity which had whilome 
subsisted betwixt men of different interests, and 
differently-placed allegiance, was now hi a mate- 
rial degree expunged ; and add to this, the articles 
which were agreed upon by the commissioners sent 
for the purpose, by which all persons who were not 


270 WEARING OF ARMS FORBIDDEN. 

gentlemen of rank and repute, were obliged to sur- 
render their offensive weapons and deadly missiles 
of war ; it was recommended that all feuds should 

* 

in future be made up by mutual agreement and the 
arbitrement of friends, instead . of resorting to 
fierce combat as of old ; that those who obstinately 
refused this counsel # sho.uld be heavily mulcted ; 
that all thieves and robbers should be punished 
with death ; and it was enacted, " that all inhabit- 
ing within Tindale and Riddesdale in Northum- 
berland, Bewcastledale, Wilgavey,*the north part 
of Oilsland, Esk and Leven in Cumberland, East 
and West Tevidale, Liddesdale, Eskdale, Ews- 
dale, and Annerdale, in Scotland, (saving noble- 
men and gentlemen unsuspected of felony or theft, 
and not being of broken clans,) and their hbuse- 
hold servants dwelling within those several places 
before recited, shall put away all armour and wea- 
pons, daggers, steel-caps, hagbuts, pistols, plate 
sleeves, and such like ; and shall not keep any horse, 
gelding, or mare above the price of fifty shillings 
sterling, or thirty pounds Scots, upon like pain of 
imprisonment. 

» 

" /tem,-»-That proclamation be made, that none 
of what calling soever, within the countries lately 
called the Borders of either of the kingdoms, 
shall wea*s carry, or bear any pistols, hagbuts, or 
guns of any sort, but in his majesty's service, upon 
pain of imprisonment, according to the laws of 
either kingdom." 


RAIDS AND FORAYS CONTINUED. 271 

• 

These were very precautionary and judicious 
enactments, but " the final Pacification of the 
Borders/ 9 as it. was called, was not so " final," and 
immediate as was intended. Men, who all their 
lives had bden brought up to hold law at defiance, 
and who had . been nurtured on the proceeds of 
rapine, were not likely to 'respect it all at once : 
and thus we find, that, during the troublous reign 
of Charles I., even so long as forty years after 
these regulations had .been made, the moss- 
troopers readily resumed their ancient pastime by 
making raids and forays over the frontier.' 

In the reign of Charles II., as also during the 
usurpation of Cromwell, we learn their existence 
still continued, by the statutes directed against 
them. In the Essay 'on Border Antiquities, a 
letter from CromwelFs head-quarters at Edinburgh 
is quoted, in which this is mentioned. " My last," 
says the writer, " told you of a letter to be sent 
to Colonels Kerr and Straughan, from hence. 
Satturday the 26th, the commissary-general dis- 
patcht away a trumpet with that letter, as also 
gave another to the Sheriff of Cumberland, to be 
speeded away to M. John Sc§t, bailiff, and B., 
brother to the Loifl of Buccliew, for his demanding 
restitution upon his tenants the moss-troopers, 
for the horses by them stolne the night we quar- 
tered in their country, since which, promises hath 
'been made of restitution, and we doubt not to 


272 THE OUTLAWS IMPROVED. 

receive it very suddenly, or else to take satisfac- 
tion another way ourselves." 

If it has ever taken three generations to make 
a gentleman, so also, it took quite as many to 
make an honest man out of a Liddesdale thief. 

Charles II. found it necessary to proceed against 
them by divers legal enactments, the preambles of 
whiclj all stated in substance — " Whereas, a 
great number of lewd, disorderly, and lawless 
persons, being thieves and robbers, who are com- 
monly called moss-troopers, have successively for 
many years past been bred, resided in, and fre- 
quented the borders of the two respective counties 
of Northumberland and Cumberland, and the most 
adjacent parts of Scotland ; and they, taking the 
opportunity of the large waste ground, heaths, and 
mosses, and the many intricate dangerous ways 
and by-paths in those parts, do usually, after. the 
most notorious crimes committed by them, escape 
over from the one kingdom to the other respective- 
ly, and se avoid the hand of justice, in regard the 
offences done and perpetrated in the one kingdom 
cannot be punished in the other. 

"And whereas, since the time of the late un- 
happy distractions, such offences and offenders as 
aforesaid have exceedingly more increased and 
abounded ; and the several inhabitants of the said 
respective counties have been, for divers years last 
past, necessitated, at their own free and voluntary" 


THE OUTLAWS IMPROVED. 273 

charge, to maintain several parties of horse for 
the necessary defence of their persons, families, 
and goods, and for bringing the offenders to justice." 

Upon this preamble follow orders for assessing 
.the inhabitants of these disturbed districts in the 
sums requisite for paying a body of men, which 
should be efficiently armed and appointed, to keep 
peace and safety throughout the frontier. 

However, fanatical and righteous-over-much the 
non-conformist preachers might have been, how- 
ever ultra- vehement, and however unnecessarily 
enthusiastic they might have displayed themselves, 
certain it is, they were the first who worked a 
beneficial alteration in the morals, of this mis- 
governed race of outlaws ; for such appears evi- 
dent from a passage in the life of Richard Came- 
ron, that same who gave name to the sect ycleped 
Cameronians. 

" After he was licensed, they sent him at first 
to preach in Annandale. He said, how could he 
go there ? He knew not what sort of people 
they were. But Mr.* Welch said, ' Go your way, 
Ritchie, and set the fire of hell to their tails. 1 
He went, and the first day he preached upon the 
text, How shall I put thee among the children, &c. 
In the application he said, * Put you among the 
children ! the offspring of robbers and thieves ! 
Many have heard of Annandale thieves. 1 Some 
of them got a merciful cast that day, and told it 

n 5 


274 THE OUTLAWS IMPROVED. 

afterwards, that it was the first field-meeting that 
ever they attended ; and that they went out of 
curiosity to see how a minister could preach in 
a tent, and people sit on the ground.' " * 

If we may believe Gleland, a Gameronian him- 
self, we may, in the first place, conceive the de- 
pravity of these " Tacking Men," or arrant rogues, 

* * • 

and afterwards their wholesome conversion. He 

says, — 

" For instance, lately on the Borders, 

There was nought but theft and murders, 
• Rapine, cheating, and resetting, 

Slight-of-hand — and fortunes getting : 

Their designation as ye ken, 

Was all along, the Tacking Men" , • 

Further on he proceeds to notice, the great 
•change that had come over them, and how eagerly 
they sought after the itinerant preachers : 

• 

" Yea, those that were the greatest rogues, 
Follow them over hills and bogues, 
Crying for mercy and for .preaching, 
For they '11 now hear no others' teaching." 

ClelamTs Poems, 1697, p. 30. 

* 
* Harrie's Scottish Worthies. 


THE PRETENDER. 275 


CHAPTER XX 


The " Pretender." 


Of two " Pretenders " ye have heard, 

Who troubled Scotland erst : 
To each we must devote a word — 

So now then for the first. 

The Revolution of 1688 in England, and the 
accession of William, gave cheering hopes of tole- 
ration to the Presbyterian party in Scotland, at 
whose head was the Duke of Hamilton. The 
Duke of Gordon, on the other hand, openly avow- 
ed his purpose of maintaining the declining in- 
terests of James, who had now just abdicated his 
throne and retired to France ; and to this end he 
shut himself up in the castle of Edinburgh. 

The interests of the new dynasty, however, 
gained the ascendancy, despite a long and bitter 
animosity that raged between the contending 
parties; so that tie old Jacobites,' after suffer- 
ing much persecution and defeat, were reduced to 


276 THE- PRETENDER. . 

insignificance, or entirely crushed, — at least for 
a time. 

James tried his fortune in Ireland; but when 
he had marched over the country with his in- 
vading forces, and had achieved one or two slight 
advantages, he was overcome at the battle of the 
Boyne, and enforced to fly back to Louis, and 
ensconce himself in his former lodgings at St. 
Germains. 

• * • 

The barbarous massacre of Glencoe, perpetrated 
at the instigation of the Earl, of Breadalbane 
against the Macdonalds, partly for state purposes 
to drive terror into the hearts of the Jacobites, 
and partly from private hate existing between 
this nobleman and the highland chief, took place 
in February 1692. King William tried in every 
way to excuse himself for having signed the order 
for this' cruel deed ; but the horror and rage which 
sprung up among the former king's faction against 
his' person and government by reason of it, was 
so great', not only in Scotland, but also in Eng- 
land, Ireland, and France, as to cause him much 
opposition, perplexity, and trouble, during the 
whole of his rpign afterwards. 

In the session of the Scottish parliament, assem- 
bled three years subsequently, the question of its 
cause was agitated v&y loudly by the members ; 
and a motion was made requiring the commis- 
sioners to exhibit their share in this affair for the 


THE PRETENDER. £77 

satisfaction of the country, together with a .report 
of the king's instructions thereon, the depositions 
of certain witnesses which had been examined, 
and copies of Secretary Dalrymple's letters, as he 
especially had been suspected of exceeding his 
instructions from the government. They begged 
that William would give such orders about him 
as he should think fit in vindication of himself and 
his government touching so atrocious a slaughter; 
that the actors concerned in it should be pro- 
secuted by the king^s advocate, according to law ; 
that those wh#had escaped actual murder, should 
be indemnified for their loss of property by plun- 
der and fire sustained at the time ; and that, for 
the peace of the country and the justification of 
all men innocent of participation or countenance 
there anent, the inquiry and the result arrived 
at, should be freely published and made known 
throughout every valley and over every highland 
mountain. 

A great deal of dissimulation, hypocrisy, and 
procrastination, however, was practised during the 
course of these things ; and though some show of 
compliance with the injured party was manifested 
at Westminster, still little was done in bringing 
the participators to justice, or of satisfying and 
appeasing the Scotch nation. 

One of the earliest questions that threatened 
anarchy and disorder between the two unsisterly 


278 THE PRETENDER. 

kingdpms was the final Treaty of Union, Queen 
Anne had appointed the Duke of Queensbury her 
High Commissioner to treat of this business north 
the Border; and on the third day of October, 
1706, he presented her Majesty's letter to the 
nation. It set forth the great advantages likely 
to accrue to the whole island in the event of a 
perfect and entire union, — that it would bring 
about a community of interests amongst all orders 
of men, than which nothing so much promotes 
friendship ; that it would lay the foundations of a 
solid and ever-enduring peace bet\feen both moie- 
ties of the. land ; fhat it would go far to soften 
down the long-existing feuds, animosities, and 
rebellions of hostile parties ; that it would increase 

their strength, their riches, their commerce ; and 

• 

that it would combine them all into one masp in 
support of the Protestanjt established religion, 
ensure their liberties at home, and render them 
superior to the assaults of their enemies abroad. • 
Notwithstanding this* measure seemed to pro- 
mise so fairly, yet there was a powerful faction 
with whom it held out anythingobut what was 
desirable. The stock of the exiled James was 
still flourishing, and this faction craved nothing 
so much as to see it recalled from a foreign soil, 
and re-established where it had heretofore swayed 
the sceptre. Hence arose the subsequent efforts 
of the Pretender. 


THE PRETENDER. ■ • 279 

The Jacobite party in Scotland made no scruple 
openly to avow, their principles, and the Duchess 
of Gordop presented to the Faculty of Advocates 
a silver medal, representing the Chevalier de St 
George, the reverse bearing the British Islands, 
with the motto " Reddite :" and for this mark 
of favour they formally thanked her for having 
given 'them q medal of " their Sovereign Lord the 
King:' 

The house of peers soon began to resound with 
boisterous harangues about the Catalans and the 
Chevalier, setting forth the danger with which the 
Protestant succession was threatened. The Cata- 
lans represented that Great Britain had encouraged 
them to declare for the House of Austria, with 
offers of support ; and complained that these pro- 
mises had not been made good. Lord Boling- 
broke, however, vindicated the queen, and said 
that her engagements abided no longer than during 
such time as King Charles, son of the Emperor 
of Germany, should reside in Spain, to the sove- 
reignty of which country it had been Anne's policy 
to assist him. The discussions touching the Pre- 
tender were carried forward with a most unheard-of 
violence : foreign monarchs were requested to aid 
in extirpating him from the face of the earth ; 
and the Lord Treasurer was charged with having 
assisted his cause in Scotland, by having for some 
years past remitted sums of money to the highland 


280 ' THE PRETENDER. 

clans, purposely to be expended in his service. 
The year after George the First came to ^the 
throne,, namely, in 1715, open warfare was com- 
menced. The Earl of Mar repaired to the High- 
lands to collect forces; he assembled three hun- 
dred of his own vassals; he proclaimed James 
Stuart. King of Great Britain at Castletown ; 
and on the sixth day of September he set up his 
standard at Brae- Mar at the head of 10,000 men. 
About this date also, two ships arrived at Arbroath 
from Havre, laden with arms, ammunition, stores, 
and a number of officers; and the Earl of Mar 
was given to understand 'that the prince was only 
detained in making some find arrangements, and 
that he would speedily follow and join his friends. 

This he did; but his affairs were desperate, 
and he was too late to achieve any benefit. . His 
infatuation urged him to ' hazard his person in 
Scotland, surrounded by the hostile .'members of a 
party infinitely stronger than his own; he left 
Dunkirk in a French vessel, and landed safely 
with only six gentlemen in his suite ; and, passing 
unknown through several towns, was met at 
Feteresso by Mar and about thirty noblemen of 
high degree. Here he was solemnly proclaimed ; 
and the declaration, dated at Comerey, was printed 
and dispersed. 

General Forster, who headed a strong detach-, 
ment of the rebel army, invaded England by the 


THE PRETENDER. 281 

Western' Marches. He passed through Gretna, 
over Solway Moss, and so on southwards via 
Carlisle, Penrith, Kendal, Lancaster, to Preston, 
leading twelve thousand soldiers with him : hut 
here they were -met by the Royalists, and neces- 
sitated to surrender. Gretna was still the seat 
of war, up to this most recent period, though we 
shall soon shew that the .buds of love were begin- 
ning to open on its genial soil. 

The young Stuart made a public entry into 
Dundee, and thence proceeded to Scone, where he 
intended to have been crowned. He enjoined the 
ministers to pray for him in their churches ; he 
ordered thanksgivings for his safe arrival to be 
made ; and though destitute of resources, he went 
through all the ceremonies of royalty. But the 
bright sun of his hopes passed its meridian, de- 
clined, and set for ever, with rapidity as great 
as it had arisen. His friends having been beaten 
in several skirmishes with the troops of his Majesty 
King George, and having been obliged to fly for 

safety, or to disperse amongst the mountains, and 

• 

himself being hotly pursued and pressed by them, 
he was driven to take present safety in a ship 
lying in the harbour of Montrose, and *to stand 
out to sea.' Fearing lest he should fall in with 
the English cruisers, that wer# beating about the 
coast, seeking whom they might entrap of his 
party, he ran over to the Shores of Norway ; 


282 


THE PRETENDER. 


and finally, on reviewing his position, and resolving 
that no alternative was left, he steered southward, 
and in a few days once more arrived in France. 
Ingens telum necessitas, and that better dish which 
the Parcae served him, he was reluctantly enforced 
to accept.. 


o 


THE YOUNG PRETENDER. . 283 


CHAPTER XXI. 

Attempt of the Young Pretender, — His advance to Derby. — 
• Retreat to Scotland. — Battle of Culloden.— Present appear- 
ance of the Field of Battle. 


And now " Pretender " No. II., 

The son of No. I. ; 
Whatever we can do for you* 

Shall here be quickly done. • 

• 

In the king's speech at the- meeting of par- 
liament, George I. told his people that he be* 
. lieved James Stuart had again landed in Scotland : 
an assertion, howbeit,' wherein was no truth ; yet 
the discarded scion of royalty was not idle, but 
was beating up for rescues and reinforcements in 
the south of Europe, and' more especially in Spain. 

The Cardinal Alberoni hatched a scheme in his 
favouf, the purport of which wag, to invade Bri- 
tain with a powerful force ; so that, encouraged 
by these offices, the Chevalier de St. George took 
an opportunity of quitting Urbino, hk place of 
residence by stealth, of embarking at Nettuno, 
and of sailing to Cagliari, where he landed. 


284 THE YOUNG PRETENDER. 

IJence he made his way to Madrid, where he was 
hailed Monarch of the United Kingdom of Great 
Britain and Ireland, with all fitting reverence, 
dignity, and honour. Ten ships of war, and six 
thousand regular troops were devoted to his ser- 
vice, and sailed from Cadiz accordingly; but a 
storm dispersed them off Cape Finisterre, and 
only two frigates reached their destination. The 
Spaniards gained a few inconsiderable successes 
in the highlands ; but being pursued by the Eng- 
lish commander they were forced to surrender, 
and three hundred of the invaders were made 
prisoners. 

But we need not dilate on all the other acts 
and deeds of the Chevalier or his partizans ; how 
he continued to promote conspiracies without in- 
termission ; how he candidly avowed in a certain 
declaration, at the bottom of which his own name 
appeared, and which was laid before the House 
of Lords by George I., that if the said King 
George would only relinquish the Kingdom of 
Great Britain to himself, the Chevalier, h£ would, 
in consideration thereof, bestow upon him the 
title of monarch of his own dominions ; and fur- 
ther, that he would secure George's future suc- 
cession to Britain, if, in time to come, his own 
issue and°heirs apparent, and all other issue and 
heirs apparent, should absolutely fail ;— how Mr. 
Robert Walpole frightened this nation out of its 


THE YOUNG PRETENDER. 285 

wits by detailing in the Commons 1 House the par- 
ticulars of a horrid and atrocious conspiracy, pur- 
posing to seize the Bank of England and the 
Exchequers and to proclaim the Pretender on the 
Royal Exchange. 

Those were stirring times, of a truth, and the 
demon of ambition was prowling about, seeking 
whom he might devour. Ambition, however, is 
only a demon when wrongly directed ; for am- 
bition that is directed in the right path, is a fair 
and honourable passion. He who is ambitious, 
seeks to better himself; and if he can rise higher 
in the scale of reputation or of fortune, without 
doing so to the detriment or prejudice of his 
fellow-labourers, he only calls into praiseworthy 
action his faculties, his natural powers, and his 
talents, (all which were given him to employ 
properly,) and he is achieving that 'which is com- 
mendable in the sight of God, as well as in the 
sight of men. We think that the word Ambition 
is a very much abused word, — in so far, that, 
according to its usual acceptation, it is held to' 
signify inordinate, unjust, or criminal thirst after 
advancement. But, ambition in a man, ought to 
mean, and strictly does mean, nothing more or less 
or otherwise, than what we term emulation in a 
schoolboy, — that spirit of activity within him, 
which urges him to fag and to climb to the top 
of his class. 


286 THE YOUNG PRETENDER. 

The Young Pretender, so called, the son of 
James, the Chevalier de St. George, now started 
up into action, and resolved to make a bold dash 
for the crown of Great Britain. His first essay 
was a failure. With the aid of Louis of France, 
he collected a fleet and a powerful land force at 
Dunkirk and Boulogne, and actually embarked 
seven thousand troops. Monsieur de Roquefeuille 
sailed up the Channel, and' cast anchor off Dun- 
geness, to wait for Monsieur de Barreil, whom he 
had despatched to hasten the embarkation with 
five ships of war. As he lay here, he was sur- 
prised to see the British fleet under Sir John 
Norris, doubling the South Foreland, and beating 
down upon him as fast as the westerly wind, then 
blowing, would allow* To the chagrin of the 
English Admiral, however, the tide ran so hard 
against him, added to the wind, which was dead 
a-head, that he could hot approach Monsieur de 
Roquefeuille by two leagues; and here also he 
was obliged to drop his anchor. 

Thus, lying within sight of each other, the 
French commander called a council of war, and 
it was deemed advisable in their present condition, 
not to seek an engagement, — but quite the con- 
trary. As if to favour their escape, the wind now 
suddenly chopped round to the north-east, coming 
on to blow hard, and they ran before it down 
Channel like the very anything you please. 


THE YOUNG PRETENDER. 28 

This gale of wind, notwithstanding that it favour- 
ed the escape of the line^of-battle ships out of 
the reach of Sir John Norris's guns, destroyed so 
many of the French transports, that the present 
scheme of invasion was obliged to be given up. 
The famous Count Saxe, who had been preferred 
to the army, when it should have reached Eng- 
land, together with the other generals under his 
commandment, returned to Paris ; and the young 
Prince Charles also retiring to his abode in that 
city, remained for a space in great privity, and 
almost entirely neglected by the court of St. 
Germain. 

In the year 1744 the Commons of England 
brought in a bill, denouncing the penalties of high 
treason against all those who should hold corre- 
spondence with the sons of the old Pretender ; 
and in the Upper House, the Lord Chancellor 
Hardwicke (to whom Gretna Green is much in- 
. debted for. its fame, as the reader will fully know 
in good time) inserted a clause, extendipg the 
crime of high treason, even to the posterity of the 
first offenders, during the lives of the Pretender's 
sons, — as if the rebellious actions of turbulent men 
could be Controlled* by their offspring, as yet, per- 
adventure unborn ! This was indeed visiting the 
sins of the fathers upon the children. The motion 
produced a warm debate, and was most vehement- 
ly* and pathetically opposed by the Duke o£ Bed- 


288 THE YOUNG PRETENDER. 

ford, the Earl of Chesterfield, and «the Lords 
Herv.ey and Talbot, as being contrary to the 
dictates of humanity, the law of nature, the rules 
of justice in a free country, and the precepts of 
religion ; and yet, O dii immortales, the clause 
was carried, and the bill was passed ! 

Albeit Charles Edward had been residing quietly 
on the margin of the Seine since his recent check, 
yet had he been making inquiry as to the num- 
ber and strength of his friends, whether on one 
side of the Channel or on the other; and had 
furthermore employed emissaries, who had been 
doing the same thing for him up and down that 
land, whose crown he so much coveted, and which 
he piously believed tojbe his own. 

He embarked for Scotland on board a small 
frigate, accompanied by the Marquis of Tullibar-. 
dine, Sir Thomas Sheridan, and certain others, 
and, for the conquest of universal Britain, he 
brought an almost incalculable force in troops 
and ammunition— the former consisting of seven 
officers, and the latter of muskets for two thousand 
men ! 

His convoy, a ship of sixty guns, fell in with 
an English-man-of-war during the passage ; and 
in an engagement with her, she received a rebuff 
so severe, that she was persuaded to return to 
Brest, in order to plug up the holes in 'her hull and 
to stitch up the rents in her canvass. 


DEBARKS AT LOCHABER. 289 

The yoirag prince, howbeit, held his course ; 
he steered for the Hebrides, and on the 27th of 
July 1745, debarked on the coast of Lochaber, 
where he was joined by fifteen hundred high- 
landers. 

We regret that he did not enter the Firth of 
Sol way, and land upon the sweet shores of Gretna, 
which was now on the dawn of celebrity — not 
that we should desire to see hostility carried 
through so amorous a region, and a region which 
had for centuries known a great deal too much 
of the bad spirit of man, as the records of these 
pages lamentably testify, — but because, in writing 
the veracious history of this parish, we are natur- 
ally desirous of discoursing about any notable 
events happening therein, — are desirous of declar- 
ing how fertile the soil is in interesting occur- 
rences, — and would especially wish to confine 
ourselves closely to the stage of this drama, and 
not wander elsewhere to tell of accessaries, how- 
ever necessarily, though sometimes remotely, bear- 
ing on the main subject. 

On the nineteenth of August the Marquis of 
Tullibardine erected his standard at Glensinnan, 
and though it is true that he was joined by a con- 
siderable number of the lovers of the old race, still, 
the heads of many of the neighbouring clans held 
back or hesitated to enrol themselves in the 
hazardry of an enterprise so desperate. 

vol. i. o 


290 TAKES SEVERAL TOWNS. 

After one or two skirmishes, wherein the new 
comers triumphed, the government at Westmin- 
ster became alarmed, and despatched an army 
northwards to crush them. 

King George at this time was in Germany, 
whither he had gone to pay a visit to his ancient 
friends, and the Young Pretender's evil genius, 
the Duke of Cumberland, was hotly at work in 
the Netherlands, " tickling the French with the 
long broad-sword," as the popular song of the day 
expressed it. The Regency that governed the 
nation during this interim, now issued a proclama- 
tion offering the sum of i?30,000, to any one who 
should capture the adventurer: and the beauty of the 
thing was, that, by way of being in no sort behind 
the government in courtesy, the Pretender also 
issued a proclamation, wherein he promised a like 
sum for the apprehension of the Elector of Hanover ! 

He prosecuted his march across Scotland,— 
took several towns on his route, and in Perth, 
Dundee, and Edinburgh proclaimed the Chevalier 
de St. George, his father, King of Great Britain. 
At Preston-pans he routed Sir John Cope in the 
space of ten minutes ; and, by the booty, stores, 
ammunition, and money, which there fell into his 
hands, he found himself suddenly rich, and effi- 
ciently provided to carry on his pretensions. 

After this victory he rested on his oars in 
Holyrood House much longer than an active 


INVESTS CARLISLE. * 291 

« 

general ought to have done, if he would wisely 
follow up an advantage gained ; but being assured 
of succours from France, he at last resolved on an 
invasion of England. 

Now, then, we must march directly through 
Gretna Green. 

Having deliberated on his line of progress over 
the border, he determined on crossing the rubicon 
by the Western Marches — and here, for " Rubi- 
con," we intreat ye to read u Sark." He marched 
on foot, dressed (or rather un-dressed) in his High- 
land costume, at the head of about five thousand 
men, albeit the weather was cold and the snow 
lay thick upon the ground ; and on the sixth of 
November he led this host over the tender soil of 
that amorous parish which lies hard by the blue 
waters of the Solway ; — he forded the aforesaid 
rubicon along with his naked-kneed followers — 
crossed the Debateable Land — and then he invest- 
ed the city of Carlisle. 

After he had set himself down before its walls, 
and had been encamped here for the duration of 
three days, the citizens either got tired of their 
own seclusion, shut up as they were, or else 
they grew right courteous to all those bare-legged 
visitors who were lying outside in the cold ; for 
certain it is, that at the termination of this period, 
the gates were thrown oJ>en, the portcullises raised, 
and the draw-bridges lowered, even as is the usage 

o 2 


292 CARLISLE SURRENDERS. 

« .* ^ *-. Mfc*. «- the ^ 
or configuration, or appliances, of the fortifications 
of the olden time ; and then there issued forth of 
one of the gateways the real mayor himself, dressed 
in his official investments, together with all the 
aldermen enrobed in theirs, who walked first 
under the portcullis without scratching their heads 
against the spikes, and then over the draw-bridge, 
on towards the Prince Charles Edward Stuart, 
otherwise ycleped the Young Pretender. When 
they came before him they fell down Upon their 
knees and delivered up to his acceptance the keys 
of their ancient city, making many reverend obei- 
sances with much humility, as if to apologise for 
their tardiness in coming ; and this act will give 
the reader an idea how faithful King George's 
public servants were to him at the very particular 
juncture when he most needed their fidelity — to 
wit, when strangers were invading his kingdom. 

With these keys the royal juvenal speedily let 
himself into the city and into the castle, where he 
found a plentiful store of acceptable needments ; 
and incontinently he was proclaimed Regent of 
Great Britain, and his father King, by the Grace 
of God, Defender of the Faith, and so forth ; and 
here again, we see how true to their duties the 
magistrates were, in so heartily seconding the 
mayor and the aldermen. • 


ADVANCE TO DERBY. 293 

Having received goodly assurances from France, 
that a diversion in his favour would soon be made 
on the southern coast of England, he left Carlisle, 
and resolved to march farther into the heart of 
the country ; wherefore he proceeded to Penrith, 
Lancaster, and Manchester. At this last he es- 
tablished his head quarters : he was joined by two 
hundred Englishmen under Colonel Townley, and 
the inhabitants greeted his coming with illumina- 
tions, bell ringing, and feasting ; and even once 
more we would call the reader's attention to the 
good service they also were doing to their rightfiil 
King George, who sat duly and legally enthroned 
at St. James's. 

m 

It is a beauteous thing for* a father to have 
dutiful children ; and So, likewise, it must be a 
glorious contemplation for a sovereign to behold 
the stanch fidelity of his people, when his enemies 
are plotting dire detriment against him. 

This last of the Stuarts tarried not long here, 
but again went forward with all expedition, cross- 
ing the Mersey, passing through divers towns, and 
on the fourth of December attaining as far as 
Defrby. The house wherein he resided during his 
brief sojourn here, is pointed out to the peregri- 
nator at this day. 

He was now within one hundred miles of the 
metropolis, and all Middlesex was in the greatest 


294 RETREAT TO SCOTLAND. 

uproar and confusion: a powerful militia was 
raised and disciplined; volunteers started up on 

all sides to defend the common cause of their 

• 

country; the weavers of Spitalfields and other 
communities entered into precautionary associa- 
tions ; the practitioners of the law, headed by the 
judges, enrolled themselves on the defensive ; and 
the managers of the theatres offered to raise a 
body of their dependents for the service of the 
Government. Orders were given for forming a 
camp on Finchley Common, where his Majesty, 
accompanied by the Earl of Stair, field marshal 
and commander-in-chief of the forces in South 
Britain, resolved to appear in person. Hogarth's 
" March to Finchley Common," was painted. to 
celebrate this event. 

But the Duke of Cumberland, recently returned 
from the Low Countries, was hurrying northwards 
to forbid this young adventurer coming any nearer, 
as matters had now become serious. 

Charles Edward Stuart did not meet with the 
encouragement or augmentation of strength during 
his transit that he had been given to expect : 
with the exception of those who joined him at 
Manchester, no friends flocked to his. standard ; 
the people seemed to be totally averse to his 
cause; the French had failed to assist him as 
they had promised; his own generals and com- 
panions were disunited among themselves; and 


BATTLE^ OF CULLODEN. 295 

he found himself in the heart of an enemy's 
country in the depth of winter, and hemmed in 
between several armies that were hourly approach- 
ing him to his destruction. 

A council of war was held, and nothing was 
left but to retreat into Scotland by the route 
they had come. Having had one or two skir- 
mishes on the way, they once more reached Car- 
lisle, and then, reinforcing the garrison of the 
castle, they paced the great Moss of Solw^y, the 
Debateable Land, and the gentle parish of Gretna 
Green. 

Divers minor affairs befel before they met the 
Duke of Cumberland on the bleak moor of Cul- 
loden, which we need not trouble tile patient 
reader with, because, as we are not writing a 
history of anything else but Gretna Green, or of 
such events as are more or less connected therewith, 
we will not digress more than is necessary. The 
Prince Pretender's army, on this last and decisive 
occasion amounted to about four thousand strong ; 
and that of the royal Duke to somewhat more. 
The action was fierce; but in the space of one 
half-hour the hopes of the Jacobites were for ever 
blasted, and many of their heads, subsequently 
struck off by the executioner upon the scaffold, 
for years decorated Temple Bar and the gates 
of Carlisle. We paid a visit to this spot not long 
ago. The moor itself is fiat, dreary, barren, and 


296 PRESENT APPEARANCE OF 

exposed ; the unenclosed part of it may comprise 
about nine square miles of brushwood, heath, fern, 
moss, and broom; and as it stands high, being 
the broad summit of a range of country rising 
from the Murray Firth, it is cruelly swept over 
by cutting breezes in the winter. 

A new road from Inverness to Forres has lately 
been cut directly across the spot where the hottest 
of the fight took place ; and nothing now remains 
to indicate this spot, but the mounds of earth 

* 

which were heaped over the buried slain. These 
consist of one long ridge where a number were 
cast into a trench and covered over, and of a 
number of scattered heaps, which have the appear- 
ance of siftgle graves. Howbeit, the poor fellows 
who lie here are not permitted to repose quietly ; 
for it is a favourite amusement with tourists of 
the present day, to carry spades and other delving 
instruments along with them to the ground, and 
there to grub in the sacred soil for the purpose 
of finding some trophy. The guide related that 
he accompanied an Irish gentleman on one of 
these mining expeditions only a short space before ; 
and that the said Irish gentleman actually turned 
up a soldier's corroded coat button, and he bore 
it off with him to the Emerald Island with many 
triumphs broached in goodly brogue. In several 
places there were fresh-made pits of from one 
to two feet deep, as if some sacrilegious enthusiast 


THE FIELD OP BATTLE. 297 

had been at work only the day before our visit ; 
but the guide did not know whether anything 
had been found. He said that, at the making of 
the new road, when the soil was slightly levelled 
in two or three places, divers swords and other 
relics were brought to the light of day ; and at 
the Octagon Tower so called, standing some three 
miles south-west of the battle-ground, there are 
still preserved two field-pieces used on the oc- 
casion. 

About a quarter of a mile eastward of this 
martial cemetery, and close by the road-side, there 
stands a large solitary block of stone, measuring 
near five feet six high, and covering a basement 
of one hundred square feet, more or less : it is 
reported that the young prince stood upon this 
stone to overlook the bloody encounter ; and that 
from this elevation he saw himself ruined. 

We must not marvel that the plain of Waterloo 
should still at times yield military exuviae to the 
searches of the curious, when we remember that 
the fight of Culloden happened nearly a century 
ago, and yet is not quite exhausted. The dig- 
ging and scrutiny, however, are often vain, and 
rare is the chance that is successful. Human 
bones were at one period not unfrequently dis- 
covered, but these have now entirely merged into 
the soil by which they were covered ; and little 

o 5 


298 


THE FIELD OF BATTLE. 


will henceforth recompense the sentimental grave- 
digger, except, peradventure, a stray tooth or so, 
and such a trophy as a button or a flattened 
bullet. 


A TRAGICAL LOVE STORY. 299 


CHAPTER XXII. 

A Tragical Love Story of the " Olden Time. 


There was a lover true indeed, 

Who lived in Annandale ; 
And in this chapter ye may read, 
Of him a piteous tale. 

One blusterous day towards eventide, a horse- 
man, clad in a coat belayed over with silver 
buttons, came hastily riding along by the waters 
of Annan, shewing many signs of impatience, as 
if he much wished to cross oyer. The river was 
broad, and the banks were high ; no passable ford 
discovered itself to the scrutiny of his -restless 
glance, and the stream rolled onward to the briny 
billows of the Firth, an unpitying barrier between 
himself and the lady of his love, whom he longed 
to be with. 

This is one of the few stories, referring to the 
days of other years, whose scene is laid on the 
arena of which we write, that touches on the 
subject of the tender passion ; most of the legends 


300 A TRAGICAL LOVE STORY 

and archives of that barbarous age being replete 
with war, martial exploits, robbery, and murder. 

The horseman had come down through the pass 
of the Gatehope Slack, which yawns across one 
verge of Annandale ; his steed was fagged, heated, 
wearied, and bespattered with mud from hard 
riding ; and it was afterwards related that he had 
spurred on over bog, moor, and moss — through 
brake and through copse— and how the sparks 
of fire had flown from the iron shoes that were 
on the fore-feet of his beast. 

" Now, my bonny mare," said he to the animal, 
as he turned her head to the stream ; " now, my 
bonny mare, play your part well and carry me 
over. If you are the steed that bears me to my 
dearie, you shall be fed with hay and corn all the 
days that you live, and the rowel of a spur shall 
never prick your flank again." 

Yet, notwithstanding she is averred to have 
been past compare for excellence, she was so 
thoroughly done up, now she came to the river, 
that no man could have urged her a furlong 
further, had he wagered a thousand marks on 
the chance ; and it is not extraordinary, therefore, 
that there existed but small hope of her being 
able to swim the torrent. 

Yet what was to be done ? Was a lover to 
be disappointed? or rather, were two lovers to 
be disappointed in greeting each other, because a 


OF THE OLDEN TIME. 301 

horse was jaded to death, or because a flood of 
water rolled between them? "Love sees path- 
ways to his will," says Shakspere, and "stony 
limits cannot hold love out," and so on; — nor 
watery ones either, say we — and Romeo Mon- 
tague, who confessed that he was " no pilot," said 
to Juliet Capulet one night, " wert thou as far as 
that vast shore, washed by the furthest sea, I 
would adventure for such merchandise." 

Now, if this young Montague, who was no 
pilot, could adventure to cross the furthest sea in 
the world, surely the juvenal before us, whose 
ardency is allowed to have been intense, could 
scarcely turn back from a fresh-water river, how- 
ever terribly it might run and roar. And, to do him 
justice, he lacked not courage ; — indeed, we think 
he is quite as highly to be commended as Romeo, 
although the' voyage was so much shorter: for 
Romeo only talked about what he would do, if his 
lady had been beyond the sea, whereas this young 
Scot made no fine speeches to the moon, but 
plunged headlong into the stream. But stay;-— 
we must not jump at the catastrophe too soon. 

Finding his horse (which, by the bye, was a 
mare) thoroughly done up, and totally unable to 
bear him over, and above all, says the chronicle, 
terrified at hearing the water-kelpies scream, he 
looked about him for rescues ; he was sorely per- 
plexed in mind, and troubled in spirit — but he 


302 A TRAGICAL LOVE STORY 

incontinently bethought him of the ferry-man, and 
him he loudly hailed. 

."Boatman," cried, he, "put off your bark 
from the shore, and row me to the opposite bank : 
make no excuses, for none will I take ; I must cross 
this angry flood to night : come, put off — here is 
gold." 

Young bloods are ever hasty and impatient ; — 
but this is nature in its real state, unrestrained by 
sober knowledge of consequences,— or by age when 
the spirits become sluggish,— or by the sufferance 
of many defeats, such as most men are tamed by, 
who have to stem, not only the torrent of rivers, 
but still more so, by haying to stem the torrent of 
adverse circumstances in going onwards through 
the world. He who would know what nature 
is, must study it as revealed in young persons 
rather* than in old ones. The nearer we go to 
the spring-head, the less sullied is the stream : and 
the nearer we go to the spring-head of our exist- 
ence,, the less sullied is our real and true cast 
of mind, with the hypocrisies, or little dissimula- 
tions, or acts of concealment, which we learn to 
practise, and by which we alter ourselves to our 
neighbours, and appear different people in age 
from what we did in youth. Children have not 
the art to conceal their passions that adults have ; 
and hence a naturally passionate child soon lets 
those who are near it know that it is passionate, 


OF THE OLDEN TIME. 303 

whenever an occasion arises to call it forth. But 
when that same child reaches " the years of dis- 
cretion," it knows how to subdue the anger that 
some inciting event may awaken ; and thus, though 
burning with rage within, may appear all calmness 
without. 

We do not believe that our in-born nature 
much changes as we live on ; but think that what- 
ever disposition we come into the world with, that 
same disposition will belong to us as long as 
we live : that a violent child will make a violent 
man; a timid child, a timid man; or an open- 
hearted child, a generous friend to all around 
him in aftertimes. These natures, severally appear- 
ing in several children, will certainly be modified, 
or softened, or directed, or regulated, by expe- 
rience, intercourse, and common sense ; but we 
contend that it i$ only a modification, and, perhaps, 
never % total or radical alteration of the original 
nature. 

The ardent juvenal, who now desired to cross 
the river, may have been born with a reckless turn, 
which may not yet have been sufficiently modified 
by experience : but, be this as it may, the most 
sober of dispositions might have been fired with a 
transient eagerness, if placed in a situation like 
his, so trying and so tantalizing. And the. man 
to whom he addressed himself may have been 
gifted at his. birth with a timidity of soul, which 


o 


304 A TRAGICAL LOVE STORY 

no long buffeting with mankind could fundament- 
ally eradicate ; but left him a man possessing not 
half the fearlessness of the young lover who spoke 
to him. It is true, their motives for the step were 
very dissimilar ; and this may have swayed their 
temporary actions, independent of their real natures. 

The stranger repeated his demand for a boat, 
and repeated his offer of gold ; but the ferry-man 
commenced by inferring arguments of mighty force 
against an enterprise so absurd and so madly 
hazardous. 

" It was but late yestreen,' 1 said he, "that I swore 
— not by one single oath, but by many,— that I 
would not set my joints to the trying of an impos- 
sibility ; and for all the gold that at this moment 
enriches the fair kingdom of Scotland, I dare not 
pilot ye over this night." 

So decided a refusal of all aid, might have 
withered the heart of any but the determined ; no 
eloquence could overrule the persistency of the 
man, or the admonitions which he endeavoured to 
give to his customer. The one was as resolved 
as the other ; this one to cross, and that one by no 
means to assent thereto. In such cases as this, 
matters are likely to come to extremity; and 
albeit these two were not Greeks, who tug hard 
when they encounter in war, still they appear to 
have tugged hard as Scotchmen, not in a matter 
of warfare, but rather in logical sophisms, and 


o 


OF THE OLDEN TIME. 305 

running counter arguments. It was all nothing — 
the lover was resolved ; and the man finding that 
persuasive words were vain, now essayed to work 
upon his fears by a tragical anecdote, — as how a 
traveller, nigh these parts met a horrible death m 
the waters. 

" I once, 1 ' he commenced solemnly, " in my 
early days heard, (I say heard, for it was night, 
and I could not see,) a traveller drowning; not 
in the Annan itself, but in the Frith of Solway, 
close by the mouth of the river. The influx of the 
tide had unhorsed him in the night, as he was 
passing the sands from Cumberland. The west 
wind blew a tempest, and, according to the common 
expression, brought in the water three foot a breast. 
The traveller got upon a standing net, a little way 
from the shore. Here he lashed himself to the 
post, shouting for half an hour for assistance, till 
the tide rose over his head ! In the darkness of 
night, and amid the pauses of the hurricane, his 
voice, heard at intervals, was exquisitely mournful. 
No one could go to his assistance — no one knew 
where he was — the sound seemed to proceed from 
the spirit of the waters. But morning rose — the 
tide had ebbed — and the poor traveller was found 
lashed to the pole of the net, and bleaching in the 
wind."* 

* This last is, in reality, part of a letter written by Dr. 
Currie, the Editor and biographer of Robert Burns, to Sir 


306 A TRAGICAL LOVE STORY 

If this was not enough to reduce a loVer to 
reason, we know not what else could succeed. 
Love and madness have ever been held to be one 
and the same thing: and, of a truth, we think 
that this lover was not far removed from the 
madman, if he could suffer his passion to conduct 
him into the rushing element.. 

All that the boatman could say in the way of 
dissuasion availed just nothing at all ; it helped 
not, it prevailed not : he saw that madmen had no 
ears. 

The tortured lover could endure no longer ; he 
threw off his coat, garnished with silver buttons, 
and rent the waistcoat from his breast : he ap- 
proached the bank near the tail of the ford ; and 
turning adrift his horse, plunged headlong into the 
roaring waters. 

He was an excellent swimmer ; and vigorous- 
ly he struck out arms and buffetted with the pass- 
ing torrent, which was here broad and deep. 
Such, however, was its violence and rapidity, that 
he was soon hurried out of his course, so as to 

Walter Scott : and is given by Sir Walter in the Minstrelsy 
of the Scottish border. 

It, of course, is no part of the old ballad which forms the 
thesis of this chapter ; but as it is so connected with the sub- 
ject, we thought we could not do better than bring it forward 
in the mouth of the ferry-man. 

Dr. Currie died at Sidmouth, in Devonshire, in 1805, and 
there is a tablet to his memory in the church. 


OF THE OLDEN TIME. 307 

be totally unable to push his way onward to the 
distant shore beyond him. He struggled — he 
gasped— he sank — he rose — he blew the water 
out of his nostrils, and made a convulsive effort to 
swim on again ; the eddy bewildered him — he 
madly caught at the branch of a bush that hung 
over him as he was swept by — alas ! it broke off 
short in his hand — he was thoroughly exhausted — 
he sank to the bottom — and he never rose to the 
surface again, but there died I 

Such was the terror and lamentation round about 
Annan when the tidings of this sad catastrophe 
became known, that a bridge was shortly built 
over the river to prevent the like in future, and 
the ford and the ferry-boat were never used after- 
wards. This was like locking the front door when 
the thief has entered. 


END OF THE FIKST VOLUME, 


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