Book: Minstrelsy of the Scottish border (3rd ed) (1 of 3)

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MINISTRELSY

OF THE

SCOTTISH BORDER:

CONSISTING OF

HISTORICAL AND ROMANTIC BALLADS,

COLLECTED

IN THE SOUTHERN COUNTIES OF SCOTLAND; WITH A FEW
OF MODERN DATE, FOUNDED UPON
LOCAL TRADITION.


IN THREE VOLUMES.



VOL. I

The songs, to savage virtue dear,
That won of yore the public ear,
Ere Polity, sedate and sage,
Had quench'd the fires of feudal rage.--WARTON.

1806.




TO

HIS GRACE,

HENRY,

_DUKE OF BUCCLEUCH_, &c.&c.&c.

THESE TALES,

WHICH

IN ELDER TIMES HAVE CELEBRATED THE PROWESS,

AND

CHEERED THE HALLS,

OF

_HIS GALLANT ANCESTORS_,

ARE RESPECTFULLY INSCRIBED

BY

HIS GRACE'S MUCH OBLIGED

AND

MOST HUMBLE SERVANT,

WALTER SCOTT.



CONTENTS
TO
THE FIRST VOLUME.


INTRODUCTION

PART FIRST.

_HISTORICAL BALLADS_.

Sir Patrick Spens,

Auld Maitland,

Battle of Otterbourne,

The Sang of the Outlaw Murray,

Johnie Armstrang,

The Lochmaben Harper,

Jamie Telfer of the Fair Dodhead,

The Raid of the Reidswire,

Kinmont Willie,

Dick o'the Cow,

Jock o'the Side,

Hobbie Noble,

Archie of Ca'field,

Armstrong's Goodnight,

The Fray of Suport,

Lord Maxwell's Goodnight,

The Lads of Wamphray,




INTRODUCTION.


From the remote period; when the Roman province was contracted by the
ramparts of Severus, until the union of the kingdoms, the borders
of Scotland formed the stage, upon which were presented the most
memorable conflicts of two gallant nations. The inhabitants, at the
commencement of this aera, formed the first wave of the torrent which
assaulted, and finally overwhelmed, the barriers of the Roman power
in Britain. The subsequent events, in which they were engaged, tended
little to diminish their military hardihood, or to reconcile them to
a more civilized state of society. We have no occasion to trace the
state of the borders during the long and obscure period of Scottish
history, which preceded the accession of the Stuart family. To
illustrate a few ballads, the earliest of which is hardly coeval with
James V. such an enquiry would be equally difficult and vain. If we
may trust the Welch bards, in their account of the wars betwixt the
Saxons and Danes of Deira and the Cumraig, imagination can hardly
form [Sidenote: 570] any idea of conflicts more desperate, than were
maintained, on the borders, between the ancient British and their
Teutonic invaders. Thus, the Gododin describes the waste and
devastation of mutual havoc, in colours so glowing, as strongly to
recall the words of Tacitus; "_Et ubi solitudinem faciunt, pacem
appellant_[1]."

[Footnote 1: In the spirited translation of this poem, by Jones, the
following verses are highly descriptive of the exhausted state of the
victor army.

At Madoc's tent the clarion sounds,
With rapid clangour hurried far:
Each echoing dell the note resounds--
But when return the sons of war!
Thou, born of stern necessity,
Dull peace! the desert yields to thee,
And owns thy melancholy sway.

At a later period, the Saxon families, who fled from the exterminating
sword of the Conqueror, with many of the Normans themselves, whom
discontent and intestine feuds had driven into exile, began to rise
into eminence upon the Scottish borders. They brought with them
arts, both of peace and of war, unknown in Scotland; and, among their
descendants, we soon number the most powerful border chiefs. Such,
during the reign of the [Sidenote: 1249] last Alexander, were Patrick,
earl of March, and Lord Soulis, renowned in tradition; and such were,
also, the powerful Comyns, who early acquired the principal sway upon
the Scottish marches. [Sidenote: 1300] In the civil wars betwixt Bruce
and Baliol, all those powerful chieftains espoused the unsuccessful
party. They were forfeited and exiled; and upon their ruins was
founded the formidable house of Douglas. The borders, from sea to
sea, were now at the devotion of a succession of mighty chiefs, whose
exorbitant power threatened to place a new dynasty upon the Scottish
throne. It is not my intention to trace the dazzling career of this
race of heroes, whose exploits were alike formidable to the English,
and to their sovereign.

The sun of Douglas set in blood. The murders of the sixth earl, and
his brother, in the castle of Edinburgh, were followed by that of
their successor, poignarded at Stirling by the hand of his prince. His
brother, Earl James, appears neither to have possessed the abilities
nor the ambition of his ancestors. He drew, indeed, against his
prince, the formidable sword of Douglas, but with a timid and
hesitating hand. Procrastination ruined his cause; and he was
deserted, at Abercorn, by the knight of Cadyow, chief of the
Hamiltons, and by his most active adherents, after they had
ineffectually exhorted him to commit [Sidenote: 1453] his fate to the
issue of a battle. The border chiefs, who longed for independence,
shewed little [Sidenote: 1455] inclination to follow the declining
fortunes of Douglas. On the contrary, the most powerful clans engaged
and defeated him, at Arkinholme, in Annandale, when, after a short
residence in England, he again endeavoured to gain a footing in his
native country[2]. The spoils of Douglas were liberally distributed
among his conquerors, and royal grants of his forfeited domains
effectually interested them in excluding his return. An [Sidenote:
1457] attempt, on the east borders, by "_the Percy and the Douglas,
both together_," was equally unsuccessful. The earl, grown old in
exile, longed once more to see his native country, and vowed, that,
[Sidenote: 1483] upon Saint Magdalen's day, he would deposit his
offering on the high altar at Lochmaben.--Accompanied by the banished
earl of Albany, with his usual ill fortune, he entered Scotland.--The
borderers assembled to oppose him, and he suffered a final defeat at
Burnswark, in Dumfries-shire. The aged earl was taken in the fight, by
a son of Kirkpatrick of Closeburn, one of his own vassals. A grant of
lands had been offered for his person: "Carry me to the king!" said
Douglas to Kirkpatrick: "thou art well entitled to profit by my
misfortune; for thou wast true to me, while I was true to myself."
The young man wept bitterly, and offered to fly with the earl into
England. But Douglas, weary of exile, refused his proffered liberty,
and only requested, that Kirkpatrick would not deliver him to the
king, till he had secured his own reward[3]. Kirkpatrick did more:
he stipulated for the personal safety of his old master. His generous
intercession prevailed; and the last of the Douglasses was permitted
to die, in monastic seclusion, in the abbey of Lindores.

[Footnote 2: At the battle of Arkinholme, the Earl of Angus, a near
kinsman of Douglas, commanded the royal forces; and the difference of
their complexion occasioned the saying, "that the _Black Douglas_ had
put down the _Red_." The Maxwells, the Johnstones, and the Scotts,
composed his army. Archibald, earl of Murray, brother to Douglas, was
slain in the action; and Hugh, Earl of Ormond, his second brother,
was taken and executed. His captors, Lord Carlisle, and the Baron of
Johnstone, were rewarded with a grant of the lands of Pittinane, upon
Clyde.--_Godscroft_, Vol. I. p. 375.--_Balfour's MS. in the Advocates'
Library, Edinburgh_.--_Abercrombie's Achievements_, Vol. II. p. 361.
_folio Ed_.--The other chiefs were also distinguished by royal favour.
By a charter, upon record, dated 25th February, 1458, the king grants
to Walter Scott of Kirkurd, ancestor of the house of Buccleuch, the
lands of Abingtown, Phareholm, and Glentonan craig, in Lanarkshire.

"_Pro suo fideli servitio nobis impenso et pro quod interfuit
in conflictu de Arkenholme in occisione et captione nostrorum
rebellium quondam Archibaldi et Hugonis de Douglas olim
comitum Moraviae et de Ormond et aliorum rebellium nostrorum
in eorum comitiva existen: ibidem captorum et interfectorum_."

Similar grants of land were made to Finnart and Arran, the two
branches of the house of Hamilton; to the chiefs of the Battisons;
but, above all, to the Earl of Angus who obtained from royal favour a
donation of the Lordship of Douglas, and many other lands, now held
by Lord Douglas, as his representative. There appears, however, to be
some doubt, whether, in this division, the Earl of Angus received more
than his natural right. Our historians, indeed, say, that William I.
Earl of Douglas, had three sons; 1. James, the 2d Earl, who died
in the field of Otterburn; 2. Archibald, the Grim, 3d Earl; and 3.
George, in right of his mother, earl of Angus. Whether, however, this
Archibald was actually the son of William, seems very doubtful; and
Sir David Dalrymple has strenuously maintained the contrary. Now, if
Archibald, the Grim, intruded into the earldom of Douglas, without
being a son of that family, it follows that the house of Angus, being
kept out of their just rights for more than a century, were only
restored to them after the battle of Arkinholme. Perhaps, this may
help to account for the eager interest taken by the earl of Angus
against his kinsman.--_Remarks on History of Scotland_, Edinburgh,
1773. p. 121.]

[Footnote 3: A grant of the king, dated 2d October, 1484, bestowed
upon Kirkpatrick, for this acceptable service, the lands of
Kirkmichael.]

After the fall of the house of Douglas, no one chieftain appears to
have enjoyed the same extensive supremacy over the Scottish borders.
The various barons, who had partaken of the spoil, combined in
resisting a succession of uncontrouled domination. The earl of Angus
alone seems to have taken rapid steps in the same course of ambition
which had been pursued by his kinsmen and rivals, the earls of
Douglas. Archibald, sixth earl of Angus, called _Bell-the-Cat_, was,
at once, warden of the east and middle marches, Lord of Liddisdale
and Jedwood forest, and possessed of the strong castles of Douglas,
Hermitage, and Tantallon. Highly esteemed by the ancient nobility,
a faction which he headed shook the throne of the feeble James
III., whose person they restrained, and whose minions they led to
an ignominious death. The king failed not to shew his sense of these
insults, though unable effectually to avenge them. This hastened his
fate: and the field of Bannockburn, once the scene of a more glorious
conflict, beheld the combined chieftains of the border counties
arrayed against their sovereign, under the banners of his own son.
The king was supported by almost all the barons of the north; but the
tumultuous ranks of the Highlanders were ill able to endure the steady
and rapid charge of the men of Annandale and Liddisdale, who
bare spears, two ells longer than were used by the rest of their
countrymen. The yells, with which they accompanied their onset,
caused the heart of James to quail within him. He deserted his host,
[Sidenote: 1488] and fled towards Stirling; but, falling from his
horse, he was murdered by the pursuers.

James IV., a monarch of a vigorous and energetic character, was well
aware of the danger which his ancestors had experienced, from the
preponderance of one overgrown family. He is supposed to have smiled
internally, when the border and highland champions bled and died in
the savage sports of chivalry, by which his nuptials were solemnized.
Upon the waxing power of Angus he kept a wary eye; and, embracing the
occasion of a casual slaughter, he compelled that earl, and his son,
to exchange the lordship of Liddisdale and the castle of Hermitage,
for the castle and lordship of Bothwell[4]. By this policy, he
prevented the house of Angus, mighty as it was, from rising to the
height, whence the elder branch of their family had been hurled.

[Footnote 4: Spens of Kilspindie, a renowned cavalier, had been
present in court, when the Earl of Angus was highly praised for
strength and valour. "It may be," answered Spens, "if all be good that
is upcome;" insinuating, that the courage of the earl might not answer
the promise of his person. Shortly after, Angus, while hawking near
Borthwick, with a single attendant, met Kilspindie. "What reason had
ye," said the earl, "for making question of my manhood? thou art a
tall fellow, and so am I; and by St. Bride of Douglas, one of us shall
pay for it!"--"Since it may be no better," answered Kilspindie, "I
will defend myself against the best earl in Scotland." With these
words they encountered fiercely, till Angus, with one blow, severed
the thigh of his antagonist, who died upon the spot. The earl then
addressed the attendant of Kilspindie: "Go thy way: tell my gossip,
the king, that here was nothing but fair play. I know my gossip will
be offended; but I will get me into Liddisdale, and remain in my
castle of the Hermitage till his anger be abated."--_Godscroft_,
Vol. II. p. 59. The price of the earl's pardon seems to have been the
exchange mentioned in the text. Bothwell is now the residence of Lord
Douglas. The sword, with which Archibald, _Bell-the-Cat_, slew Spens,
was, by his descendant, the famous Earl of Morton, presented to Lord
Lindsay of the Byres, when, about to engage in single combat with
Bothwell, at Carberry-hill--_Godscroft_, Vol. II. p. 175.]

Nor did James fail in affording his subjects on the marches marks
of his royal justice and protection. [Sidenote: 1510] The clan of
Turnbull having been guilty of unbounded excesses, the king came
suddenly to Jedburgh, by a night march, and executed the most rigid
justice upon the astonished offenders. Their submission was made with
singular solemnity. Two hundred of the tribe met the king, at the
water of Rule, holding in their hands the naked swords, with which
they had perpetrated their crimes, and having each around his neck the
halter which he had well merited. A few were capitally punished, many
imprisoned, and the rest dismissed, after they had given hostages for
their future peaceable demeanour.--_Holinshed's Chronicle, Lesly_.

The hopes of Scotland, excited by the prudent and spirited conduct
of James, were doomed to a sudden and fatal reverse. Why should
we recapitulate the painful tale of the defeat and death of a
high-spirited prince? Prudence, policy, the prodigies of superstition,
and the advice of his most experienced counsellors, were alike unable
to subdue in James the blazing zeal of romantic chivalry. The monarch,
and the flower of his nobles, [Sidenote: 1513] precipitately rushed to
the fatal field of Flodden, whence they were never to return.

The minority of James V. presents a melancholy scene. Scotland,
through all its extent, felt the truth of the adage, "that the country
is hapless, whose prince is a child." But the border counties, exposed
from their situation to the incursions of the English, deprived of
many of their most gallant chiefs, and harassed by the intestine
struggles of the survivors, were reduced to a wilderness, inhabited
only by the beasts of the field, and by a few more brutal warriors.
Lord Home, the chamberlain and favourite of James IV., leagued with
the Earl of Angus, who married the widow of his sovereign, held, for
a time, the chief sway upon the east border. Albany, the regent of the
kingdom, bred in the French court, and more accustomed to wield the
pen than the sword, feebly endeavoured to controul a lawless nobility,
to whom his manners appeared strange, and his person [Sidenote:
1516] despicable. It was in vain that he inveigled the Lord Home to
Edinburgh, where he was tried and executed. This example of justice,
or severity, only irritated the kinsmen and followers of the deceased
baron: for though, in other respects, not more sanguinary than the
rest of a barbarous nation, the borderers never dismissed from their
memory a deadly feud, till blood for blood had been exacted, to the
uttermost drachm[5]. Of this, the fate of Anthony d'Arcey, Seigneur de
la Bastie, affords a melancholy example. This gallant French cavalier
was appointed warden of the east marches by Albany, at his first
disgraceful retreat to France. Though De la Bastie was an able
statesman, and a true son of chivalry, the choice of the regent was
nevertheless unhappy. The new warden was a foreigner, placed in the
office of Lord Home, as [Sidenote: 1517] the delegate of the very man,
who had brought that baron to the scaffold. A stratagem, contrived by
Home of Wedderburn, who burned to avenge the death of his chief, drew
De la Bastie towards Langton, in the Merse. Here he found himself
surrounded by his enemies. In attempting, by the speed of his horse,
to gain the castle of Dunbar, the warden plunged into a morass, where
he was overtaken and cruelly butchered. Wedderburn himself cut off his
head; and, in savage triumph, knitted it to his saddle-bow by the
long flowing hair, which had been admired by the dames of
France.--_Pitscottie, Edit_. 1728, p. 130. _Pinkerton's History of
Scotland_, Vol. II. p. 169 [6].

[Footnote 5: The statute 1594, cap. 231, ascribes the disorders on the
border in a great measure to the "counselles, directions, receipt,
and partaking, of chieftains principalles of the branches, and
househalders of the saides surnames, and clannes, quhilkis bears
quarrel, and seeks revenge for the least hurting or slauchter of ony
ane of their unhappy race, although it were ardour of justice, or in
rescuing and following of trew mens geares stollen or reft."]

[Footnote 6: This tragedy, or, perhaps, the preceding execution of
Lord Home, must have been the subject of the song, the first two lines
of which are preserved in the _Complaynt of Scotland_;

God sen' the Duc hed byddin in France,
And de la Baute had never come hame.

P, 100, Edin. 1801.]

The Earl of Arran, head of the house of Hamilton was appointed to
succeed De la Bastie in his perilous office. But the Douglasses, the
Homes, and the Kerrs, proved too strong for him upon the [Sidenote:
1520] border. He was routed by these clans, at Kelso, and afterwards
in a sharp skirmish, fought betwixt his faction and that of Angus, in
the high-street of the metropolis[7].

[Footnote 7: The particulars of this encounter are interesting. The
Hamiltons were the most numerous party, drawn chiefly from the western
counties. Their leaders met in the palace of Archbishop Beaton, and
resolved to apprehend Angus, who was come to the city to attend the
convention of estates. Gawain Douglas, bishop of Dunkeld, a near
relation of Angus, in vain endeavoured to mediate betwixt the
factions. He appealed to Beaton, and invoked his assistance to prevent
bloodshed. "On my conscience," answered the archbishop, "I cannot
help what is to happen." As he laid his hand upon his breast, at this
solemn declaration, the hauberk, concealed by his rocket, was heard
to clatter: "Ah! my lord!" retorted Douglas, "your conscience sounds
hollow." He then expostulated with the secular leaders, and
Sir Patrick Hamilton, brother to Arran, was convinced by his
remonstrances; but Sir James, the natural son of the earl, upbraided
his uncle with reluctance to fight. "False bastard!" answered Sir
Patrick, "I will fight to day where thou darest not be seen." With
these words they rushed tumultuously towards the high-street, where
Angus, with the prior of Coldinghame, and the redoubted Wedderburn,
waited their assault, at the head of 400 spearmen, the flower of the
east marches, who, having broke down the gate of the Netherbow, had
arrived just in time to the earl's assistance. The advantage of the
ground, and the disorder of the Hamiltons, soon gave the day to Angus.
Sir Patrick Hamilton, and the master of Montgomery, were slain. Arran,
and Sir James Hamilton, escaped with difficulty; and with no less
difficulty was the military prelate of Glasgow rescued from the
ferocious borderers, by the generous interposition of Gawain Douglas.
The skirmish was long remembered in Edinburgh, by the name of "Cleanse
the Causeway."--_Pinkerton's History_, Vol. II. p. 181.--_Pitscottie
Edit._ 1728. p. 120.--_Life of Gawain Douglas, prefixed to his
Virgil_.]

The return of the regent was followed by the banishment of Angus,
and by a desultory warfare with England, carried on with mutual
incursions. Two gallant armies, levied by Albany, were dismissed
without any exploit worthy notice, while Surrey, at the head of ten
thousand cavalry, burned Jedburgh, and laid waste all Tiviotdale. This
general pays a splendid tribute to the gallantry of the border chiefs.
He terms them "the boldest [Sidenote: 1523] men, and the hottest, that
ever I saw any nation[8]."

[Footnote 8: A curious letter from Surrey to the king is printed in
the Appendix, No. I.]

Disgraced and detested, Albany bade adieu to Scotland for ever. The
queen-mother, and the Earl of Arran, for some time swayed the kingdom.
But their power was despised on the borders, where Angus, though
banished, had many friends. Scot of Buccleuch even appropriated to
himself domains, belonging to the queen, worth 4000 merks yearly;
being probably the castle of Newark and her jointure lands in Ettrick
forest[9].--

[Footnote 9: In a letter to the Duke of Norfolk, October 1524, Queen
Margaret says, "Sen that the Lard of Sessford and the Lard of Baclw
vas put in the castell of Edinbrouh, the Erl of Lenness hath past hyz
vay vythout lycyens, and in despyt; and thynkyth to make the brek that
he may, and to solyst other lordis to tak hyz part; for the said lard
of Bavkl wvas hyz man, and dyd the gretyst ewelyz that myght be dwn,
and twk part playnly vyth theasyz as is well known."--_Cot. MSS.
Calig._ B.I.]

This chief, with Kerr of Cessford, was committed to ward, from which
they escaped, to join [Sidenote: 1525] the party of the exiled Angus.
Leagued with these, and other border chiefs, Angus effected his return
to Scotland, where he shortly after acquired possession of the supreme
power, and of the person of the youthful king. "The ancient power of
the Douglasses," says the accurate historian, whom I have so often
referred to, "seemed to have revived; and, after a slumber of near
a century, again to threaten destruction to the Scottish
monarchy."--_Pinkerton_, Vol. 11, p. 277.

In fact, the time now returned, when no one durst strive with a
Douglas, or with his follower. For, although Angus used the outward
pageant of conducting the king around the country, for punishing
thieves and traitors, "yet," says Pitscottie, "none were found greater
than were in his own company." The high spirit of the young king was
galled by the ignominious restraint under which he found himself; and,
in a progress to the border for repressing the Armstrongs, he probably
gave such signs of dissatisfaction, as excited the [Sidenote: 1526]
laird of Buccleuch to attempt his rescue.

This powerful baron was the chief of a hardy clan, inhabiting Ettrick
forest, Eskdale, Ewsdale, the higher part of Tiviotdale, and a portion
of Liddesdale. In this warlike district he easily levied a thousand
horse, comprehending a large body of Elliots, Armstrongs, and other
broken clans, over whom the laird of Buccleuch exercised an extensive
authority; being termed, by Lord Dacre, "chief maintainer of all
misguided men on the borders of Scotland."--_Letter to Wolsey_, July
18. 1528. The Earl of Angus, with his reluctant ward, had slept at
Melrose; and the clans of Home and Kerr, under the Lord Home, and
the barons of Cessford, and Fairnihirst, had taken their leave of
the king, when, in the gray of the morning, Buccleuch and his band
of cavalry were discovered, hanging, like a thunder-cloud, upon the
neighbouring hill of Haliden[10]. A herald was sent to demand his
purpose, and to charge him to retire. To the first point he answered,
that he came to shew his clan to the king, according to the custom of
the borders; to the second, that he knew the king's mind better than
Angus.--When this haughty answer was reported to the earl, "Sir," said
he to the king, "yonder is Buccleuch, with the thieves of Annandale
and Liddesdale, to bar your grace's passage. I vow to God they shall
either fight or flee. Your grace shall tarry on this hillock, with my
brother George; and I will either clear your road of yonder banditti,
or die in the attempt." The earl, with these words, alighted, and
hastened to the charge; while the Earl of Lennox (at whose instigation
Buccleuch made the attempt), remained with the king, an inactive
spectator. Buccleuch and his followers likewise dismounted, and
received the assailants with a dreadful shout, and a shower of lances.
The encounter was fierce and obstinate; but the Homes and Kerrs,
returning at the noise of battle, bore down and dispersed the left
wing of Buccleuch's little army. The hired banditti fled on all sides;
but the chief himself, surrounded by his clan, fought desperately
in the retreat. The laird of Cessford, chief of the Roxburgh Kerrs,
pursued the chace fiercely; till, at the bottom of a steep path,
Elliot of Stobs, a follower of Buccleuch, turned, and slew him with a
stroke of his lance. When Cessford fell, the pursuit ceased. But his
death, with those of Buccleuch's friends, who fell in the action, to
the number of eighty, occasioned a deadly feud betwixt the names
of Scott and Kerr, which cost much blood upon the marches[11].--See
_Pitscottie_, _Lesly_, and _Godscroft_.

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