NOTES AND ILLUSTRATIONS.

Lettee A, page 41.

Site of the Battle of Harlaw.

In the manuscript geographical de­
scription of Scotland, collected by Mac­
farlane, and preserved in the Advocates’
Library, vol. i. p. 7, there is the follow­
ing minute description of the site of this
battle: — “ Through this parish (the
Chapel of Garioch, called formerly, Ca­
pella Beate Mariæ Virginie de Garryoch,
Chart. Aberdon., p. 31) runs the king’s
highway from Aberdeen to Inverness,
and from Aberdeen to the high country.
A large mile to the east of the church
lies the field of an ancient battle, called
the battle of Harlaw, from a country
town of that name hard by. This town,
and the field of battle, which lies along
the king’s highway upon a moor, ex­
tending a short mile from SE. to NW.,
stands on the north-east side of the
water of Ury, and a small distance
therefrom. To the west of the field of
battle, about half a mile, is a farmer’s
house, called Legget’s Den, hard by, in
which is a tomb, built in the form of a
malt steep, of four large stones, covered
with a broad stone above, where, as the
country people generally report, Donald
of the Isles lies buried, being slain in
the battle, and therefore they call it
commonly Donald’s tomb.” So far the
MS. It is certain, however, that the
Lord of the Isles was not slain. This
may probably be the tomb of the chief
of Maclean, or of Macintosh, both of
whom fell in the battle. In the genea­
logical collections of the same industri-
ous antiquary, (MS. Advocates’ Library,
Jac. V. 4, 16, vol. i. p. 180,) we find a
manuscript account of the family of
Maclean, which informs us that kauch­

lan Lubanich had, by M’Donald’s daugh­
ter, a son, called Eachin Rusidh ni Cath,
or Hector Eufus Bellicosus. He com­
manded as lieutenant-general under the
Earl of Ross at the battle of Harlaw in
1411, where he and Irvine of Drum,
seeking out one another by their armo­
rial bearings on their shields, met and
killed each other. He was married to
a daughter of the Earl of Douglas.

Sir Walter Ogilvy, on 28th January
1426, founded a chaplainry in the parish
church of St Mary of Uchterhouse, in
which perpetual prayers were to be of­
fered up for the salvation of King James
and his Queen Johanna; and for the
souls of all who died in the battle of
Harlaw. Diplom. Regior. Indices, vol.
i. p. 97.

Lettee B, page 42.

The Retour of Andrew de Tullidiff,
mentioned in the text, will be found in
the MS. Cartulary of Aberdeen, pre­
served in the Advocates’ Library, folio
121. It is as follows :—

“ Inquisitio super tercia parte
Ledintusche et Rothmais.

Hæc inquisitio facta fuit apud rane
coram Willmo de Cadyhow Ballivo
Reverendi in Christo patris, et Dni
Gilberti Dei gracia Episcopi Aberdonen:
dic martis, nono die mensis Maii anno
1413, per probos et fideles homines sub­
scriptos, viz., Robertum de Buthergask,
Johannem Rous, Johannem Bisete, Ro­
bertum Malisei, Hugonem de Kyncavil,
Duncanum de Curquhruny, Johannem
Morison, Johm Yhung, Adam Johannis,
Johannem Thomson, Johannem de Lo­
vask, Johannem Duncanson, Walterum
Ranyson, et Johannem Thomson de

378 HISTORY OF SCOTLAND.

Petblayne. Qui magno sacramento ju­
rati dicunt, quod quondam Willmus de
Tulidef latoris præsencium obiit vestitus
et saysitus ut de feodo ad pacem et
fidem Dni nostri regis, de tercia parte
terrarum de Ledyntusche, et de Roth­
mais cum pertinenciis jacentium in
schyra de Rane infra Yicecom. de Aber­
den. Et quod dictus Andreas est leg­
gitimus et propinquior heres ejusdem
quondam Willmi patris sui de dicta
tercia parte dictarum terrarum cum per­
tinenciis, et licet minoris ætatis existit
tamen secundum quoddam statutum
consilii generalis ex priviligio concesso
hæredibus occisorum in bello de Hare­
law, pro defensione patriæ, est hac vice
leggittime ætatis, et quod dicta tercia
dictarum terrarum cum pertinenciis
nunc valet per annum tres libras, et
viginti denarios, et valuit tempore pacis
quatuor libras,” &c, &c. The remain­
der of the deed is uninteresting.

Letter C, page 47.
Battles of Baugè and Verneuil.

The exploits of the Scottish forces in
France do not properly belong to the
History of Scotland, and any reader
who wishes for authentic information
upon the subject will find it in Fordun
a Goodal, vol. ii. pp. 461, 463, and
Monstrelet’s Chronicle, by Johnes, vols.
v. and vi. There were three import­
ant battles in which the Scots auxiliaries
were engaged. First, that of Baugè, in
Anjou, fought on the 22d March 1421, in
which they gained a signal victory over
the Duke of Clarence, who was slain,
along wifch the “flower of his chivalry
and esquiredom,” to use the words of
Monstrelet. Secondly, that of Crevant,
which was disastrous to the Scots.
And lastly, the great battle of Yerneuil,
fought in 1424, in which John, duke of
Bedford, commanded the English, and
completely defeated the united army of
the French and Scots.

There is a singular coincidence be­
tween the battle of Baugè and the battle
of Stirling, in which Wallace defeated
Surrey and Cressingham. The two
armies, one commanded by the Duke of
Clarence, and the other by the Earl of
Buchan, were separated from each other
by a rapid river, over which was thrown a
narrow bridge. Buchan had despatched
a party, under Sir Robert Stewart of
Darnley, and the Sieur de Fontaine, to
reconnoitre, and they coming suddenly
upon the English, were driven back in

time to warn the Scottish general of the
approach of Clarence. Fortunately, he
had a short interval allowed him to
draw up his army, whilst Sir Robert
Stewart of Railston, and Sir Hugh Ken­
nedy, with a small advanced body, de­
fended the passage of the bridge, over
which the Duke of Clarence, with his
best officers, were eagerly forcing their
way, having left the bulk of the English
army to follow as they best could. The
consequences were almost precisely the
same as those which took place at Stir­
ling. Clarence, distinguished by his
coronet of jewels over his helmet, and
splendid armour, was first fiercely at­
tacked by John Carmichael, who shiver­
ed his lance on him; then wounded in
the face by Sir William de Swynton;
and lastly, felled to the earth and slain
by the mace of the Earl of Buchan.¹
His bravest knights and men-at-arms
f ell along with him ; and the rest of the
army, enraged at the disaster, and
crowding over the bridge to avenge it,
being thrown into complete disorder, as
they arrived in detail, were slain or
taken by the Scots. Monstrelet² affirms
that two or three thousand English were
slain. Bower limits the number who
fell to sixteen hundred and seventeen,
and asserts that the Scots only lost
twelve, and the French two men.³ It
is well known that for this service
Buchan was rewarded with the baton of
Constable of France. After the battle,
Sir Robert Stewart of Darnley bought
Clarence’s jewelled coronet from a Scot­
tish soldier for 1000 angels.⁴

Having been thus successful at Baugè,
the conduct of the Scots at Crevant,
considering the circumstances under
which the battle was fought, is inexpli-
cable. On consulting Monstrelet,⁵ it
will be found that the river Yonne
separated the two armies, over which
there was a bridge as at Baugè. The
Scots occupied a hill near the river,
with the town of Crevant, to which they
had laid siege, in their rear. Over this
bridge they suffered the whole English
army to defile, to arrange their squares,

¹ Fordun a Goodal, vol. ii. p. 461. This
John, or, as he is called by Douglas, Sir John
Carmichael, was ancestor to the noble family
of Hyndford, now extinct. The family crest
is still a shivered spear. Douglas, vol. i. p.
752.

² Monstrelet, by Johnes, vol. v. p. 263.

³ Fordun a Goodal, vol. ii. p. 461.

⁴ Grough’s Sepulchral Monuments, vol. ii,
p. 58.

⁵ Vol. vi. p. 48.

NOTES AND ILLUSTRATIONS. 379

and to advance in firm order against
them, when they might have pre-occu-
pied the tête-du-pont, and attacked the
enemy whilst they were in the act of
passing the river. Either the circum­
stances of the battle have come down to
us in a garbled and imperfect state, or
it is the fate of the Scots to shut their
eyes to the simplest lessons in military
tactics,—lessons, too, which, it may be
added, have often been written against
them with sharp pens and bloody ink.
The consequences at Crevant were fatal.
They were attacked in the front by the
Earls ôf Salisbury and Suffolk, and in
the rear by a sortie from the town of
Crevant, and completely defeated.¹

The battle of Verneuil was still more
disastrous, and so decisive, that it ap­
pears to have completely cooled all
future desires upon the part of the
Scots to send auxiliaries to France.
The account given by Bower² is, at
first sight, confused and contradictory;
but if the reader will compare it with
Monstrelet, vol. vi. pp. 90, 94, it be­
comes clearer. It seems to have been
lost by the Scots, in consequence of the
unfortunate dissension between them
and their allies the French, which pre­
vented one parfc of the army from co­
operating with the other; whilst on the
side of the English, the steadiness of
the archers, each of whom had a sharp
double-pointed stake planted beforehim,
defeatedthe charge of the Lombard cross-
bowmen, although they were adrnirably
armed and mounted.³

Letter D, page 49.

In this treaty for the relief of James
the First, which is to be found in Ry­
mer’s Fœdera, vol. x. p. 307, the list
which contains the names of the host­
ages is not a little curious, as there is
added to the name of each baron a
statement of his yearly income, pre­
senting us with an interesting picture
of the comparative wealth of the mem­
bers of the Scottish aristocracy in 1423.
The list is as f ollows :—

Thomas Comes Moraviæ, reddituatus
et possessionatus ad M. marc.

Alexander Comes Crauffurdiæ, vel
filius ejus et hæredes ad M. marc.

Willielmus Comes Angusiæ, ad vi C
marc.

¹ Monstrelet, vol. vi. pp. 48, 49.

² Fordun a Goodal, vol. ii. p. 463.

³ Ibid.

Maletius Comes de Stratherne, ad v C
marc.

Georgius Comes Marchiarum, vel
filius ejus primogenitus acl viii C marc.

David filius primogenitus Comitis
Atholiæ, vel filius ejus et hæres ad xii
C marc.

Willielmuš Constabularius Scotiæ, vel
filius et hæres ad viii. C marc.

Dominus Bobertus de Erskyn, ad M.
marc.

Bobertus Marescallus Scotiæ, vel
filius ejus et hæres ad viii C marc.

Walterus Dominus de Dr.ybtoun
(Drylton) vel filius ejus et hæres ad viii
C marc.

Johannes Dominus de Cetoun, miles
vel filius ejus et hæres ad vi C marc.

Johannis de Montgomery, miles de
Ardrossane, vel filius ejus et hæres ad vii
C marc.

Alexander Dominus de Gordonne, ad
iv C marc.

Malcolmus Dominus de Bygare, ad
vi C marc.

Thomas Dominus de Yestyr, ad vi C
marc.

Johannis Kennady de Carryk, ad v C
marc.

Thomas Boyde de Kylmernok, vel
filius ejus et hæres ad v C marc.

Patricius de Dounbarre Dominus de
Canmok, vel filius ejus et hæres ad v
C marc.

Jacobus Dominus de Dalketh, vel
filius ejus primogenitus ad xv C marc.

Duncanus Dominus de Argill, ad xv
C marc.4

Johannes Lyon de Glammis, ad vi C
marc.

Letter E, page 60.

It is not easy to account for the high
character of Albany, which is given both
by Winton and by Bower. It is certain,
because it is proved by his actions,
which are established upon authentic
evidence, that he was a crafty and sel­
fish usurper, whose hands were stained
wifch the blood of the heir to the crown
—yet he is spoken of by both these
writers, not only without severity, but
with enthusiastic praise. Indeed, Win­
fcon’s character of him might serve for
the beau ideal of a perfect king. Vol.
ii. p. 418.

Bower, though shorter, is equally
complimentary, and throws in some
fcouches which give individuality to the

⁴ It may be conjectured, that there is some
error both here and in the preceding name.

380 HISTORY OF SCOTLAND.

picture. On one occasion, in the midst
of the tumult of war, and the havoc of
a Border raid, we find the governor re­
cognised by his soldiers as a collector of
the relics of earlier ages, (Fordun a
Goodal, vol. ii. p. 409,) and at another
time a still finer picture is presented of
Albany sitting on the ramparts of the
castle of Edinburgh, and discoursing to
his courtiers, in a clear moonlight night,
on the system of the universe, and the
causes of eclipses. I am sorry I have
neglected to mark the page where this
occurs, and cannot find it at the moment.

Letter F, page 69.

A curious instrument, which throws
some light on the state of the Highlands
in 1420, and gives an example of the
mixture of Celtic and Norman names,
is to be found in a MS. in the Adv.
Lib., Jac. V. 4. 22, entitled Diploma-
tum Collectio. It is as follows :—

“ John Touch, be the grace of God
Bishop of Rosse; Dame Mary of ye Ile,
Lady of the Yles and of Kosse ; Hu­
cheon Fraser, Lord of the Lovat; John
Macloyde, Lerde of Glenelg; Angus
Guthrason of the Ylis ; Schyr William
Farquhar, Dean of Rosse; Walter of
Douglas, Scheraff of Elgin; Walter of
Innes, Lord of that ilke ; John Syncler,
Lord of Deskford; John ye Ross, Lord
of Kilravache ; John M’Ean of Arna­
murchan, with mony othyr,—Til al and
syndry to the knawledge of the quhilkis
thir present lettres sal to cum, gretyng
in God ay listand. Syn it is needeful
and meritabil to ber lele witness to
suthfastness to your Universitie, we mak
knawyn throche thir present lettres,
that on Friday the sextent day of the
moneth of August, ye yher of our Lord
a thousand four hundreth and twenty
yher, into the kyrke yharde of the
Chanonry of Bossmarkyng, compeirit
William the Grahame, the sone and the
hayr umquhil of Henry the Grame. In
presence of us, befor a nobil Lorde and
a mychty, Thomas Earl of Moreff, his
ovyr lord of his lands of the Barony of
Kerdale, resignande of his awin free
will, purly and symply, be fast and bas­
ton, intill the hands of the sayde Lorde
the Erle,” &c. An entail of the lands
follows, which is uninteresting.

At page 263 of the same volume, we
find a charter granted by David II., in
the 30th year of his reign, entitled,
“ Carta remissionis Thomæ Man et
multis aliis, act:onis et sectæ regiæ tum

pro homicidiis, combustionibus, furtis,
rapinis,” &c,, in which the preponder-
ance of Celtic names is very striking.
The names are as follows :—“ Thomas
Man, Bridan filii Fergusi, Martino More,
Maldoveny Beg Maldowny- Macmarti-
can, Cristino filio Duncani, Bridano
Breath, Alex^ro Macronlet Adæ Molen­
dinario, Martini M’Coly, Fergusio Cleri
co Donymore, Michaeli Merlsway, Bri
dano M’Dor, Maldowny M’Robi, Colano
M’Gilbride, Maldowny Macenewerker
et Adæ Fovetour latoribus presencium,
&c. Apud Perth, primo die Novemb
regni xxx. quinto.

Letter G, page 92.

I am indebted for the communication
of the following charter to the Bev. Mr
Macgregor Stirling, a gentleman inti­
mately acquainted with the recondite
sources of Scottish History:—

Apud Edinburgh, Aug. 15,
1451, a. r. 15.

Rex [Jacobus II.] confirmavit Bo­
berto Duncansoun de Strowane, et
heredibus suis, terras de Strowane,—
terras dimidicatis de Rannach,—terras
de Glennerach,—terras de duobus Bo­
haspikis,—terras de Grannecht, cum
lacu et insula lacus ejusdem,—terras de
Carric,—terras de Innercadoune,—de
Farnay,—de Disert, Faskel, de Kylkeve,
—de Balnegarde, — et Balnefarc, — et
terras de Glengary, cum foresta ejus­
dem, in comitatu Atholie, vic. de Perth,
quas dictus Robertus, in eastrum [sic]
Regium de Blar in Atholia personaliter
resignavit, et quas rex in unam inte­
gram Baroniam de Strowane univit efc
incorporavit (pro zelo, fauore, amore,
quas rex gessit erga dictum Robertum
pro captione nequissimi proditoris quon­
dam Roberti de Grahame, et pro ipsius
Roberti Duncansoune gratuitis diligen-
ciis et laboribus, circa captionem ejus­
dem sevissimi proditoris, diligentissime
et cordialissime factis.)—Mag. Sig. iv.
227.

Letter H, page 132.
Boece and the Story of the Bull's Head.

The story of the bull’s head being
presented to the Douglases at the ban­
quet, as a signal for their death, ap­
pears, as far as I have discovered, for
the first time, in Hector Boece, p. 363 :
—" Gubernator, assentiente Cancellario,
. . . amotis epulis, taurinum caput ap­
poni jubet. Id enim est apud nostrates

KÖTES AND ILLUSTRATIONS. 381

supplicii capitalis symbolum.“ Although
this extraordinary circumstance is not
found in the Auchinleck Chronicle, an
almost contemporary authority, yet, had
I found evidence of the truth of Boece’s
assertion, that the production of a bull’s
head was amongst our countrymen a
well-known signal for the infliction of a
capital punishment, I should have hesi­
tated before rejecting the appearance of
this horrid emblem immediately pre­
vious to the seizure of the Douglases.
The truth is, however, that the produc­
tion of such a dish as a bull’s head, or,
according to the version of the tale
given by a great writer,¹ a black bull’s
head, as an emblem of death, is not to
be found in any former period of our
history, or in any Celtic tradition of
which I am aware. For this last asser­
tion, the non-existence of any Celtic
or Highland tradition of date prior to
Boece’s history, where this emblem is
said to have been used, I rest not on
my own judgment, for I regret much
I am little read in Gaelic antiquities,
but on the information of my friends,
Mr Gregory, secretary to the Society of
Antiquaries, and the Reverend Mr
Macgregor Stirling, who are, perhaps,
amongst the ablest of our Celtic anti­
quaries.² After the time of Boece,
whose work was extremely popular in
Scotland, it is by no means improbable
that the tale of the bull’s head should
have been transplanted into Highland
traditions. Accordingly I understand,
from Mr Stirling, that Sir Duncan
Campbell, the seventh laird of Glen­
urcha, on an occasion somewhat similar
to the murder of the Douglases, is said
to have produced a bull’s head at table,
which caused his victims to start from

¹ Sir Walter Scott’s History of Scotland,
vol. i. p. 281.

² Mr Gregory, I am happy to see, is about
to publish "A History of the Western High­
lands and the Hebrides during the Sixteenth
and Seventeenth Centuries.” Hitherto, all
that we know of the history of this most in­
teresting portion of the kingdom, is perplex-
ing, vague, and traditionary. But, from the
mass of authentic materials which the indus­
try of the secretary of the antiquaries has
collected, a valuable work may at last be ex­
pected.

The able work alluded to in the above note
appeared in 1836. Its author, in whom I lost
a friend always ready to communicate infor­
mation out of his abundant stores, died in the
course of the same year. He was the son of
the celebrated Dr Gregory of Edinburgh—the
direct descendant of a family long distin­
guished for hereditary talent of the highest
kind.

the board and escape. Sir Duncan
lived in the interval between 1560 and
1631.

Letter I, page 133.

George, Earl of Angus.

It is to be regretted that Godscroft,
in his " History of the House of Douglas
and Angus,” vol. i. p. 287, instead of his
own interminable remarks and digres­
sions, had not given us the whole of
the ancient ballad in which some indig­
nant minstrel expressed his abhorrence
of the deed. One stanza only is pre­
served :—

“ Edinburgh Castle, Town and Tower,
God grant thou sink for sin,
And that even for the black dinner
Earl Douglas gat therein.”

The late Lord Hailes, in his Remarks on
the History of Scotland, chap. vii., satis­
factorily demonstrated “that Archi­
bald, third earl of Douglas, could not,
according to the common opinion, have
been a brother of James, second earl of
Douglas, slain at Otterburn, andthat he
did not succeed to the earldom in right
of blood. “ He added— ’’ By what means,
or under what pretext, George, earl of
Angus, the undoubted younger brother
of Earl James, was excluded from the
succession, it is impossible at this dis­
tance of time to determine. During
the course of almost a century the de­
scendants of Archibald, third earl of
Douglas, continued too powerful for the
peace of the crown, or for their own
safety. At length, in 1488, the male
line ended by the death of James, ninth
earl of Douglas, and the honours of
Douglas returned into the right channel
of Angus.” A learned and, as it ap­
pears, conclusive solution of this diffi­
culty, appeared in a paper in the Scots
Magazine for September 1814, where it
is shewn that George, earl of Angus, con­
sidered by Lord Hailes, by Douglas, and
all our genealogical writers, as the legi­
timate brother of James, earl of Douglas,
was an illegitimate son of William, earl
of Douglas, and as such had no title to
succeed to the earldom. It is to be
wished that the same acute antiquary,
who has successfully solved this and
many other genealogical difficulties,
would bring his researches to bear upon
some of those obscurer points in the his­
tory of the country, which are intimately
connected with genealogy, and would
derive from it important illustration.
The hypothesis, for instance, upon

882 HISTORY OF SCOTLAND.

which I have ventured as to the causes
which may have led to the trial and
execution of “william, sixth earl of
Douglas, and his brother David, in
1440, is an example of one of the sub­
jects upon which an intimate knowledge
of genealogy might enable its possessor
to do much for history.

Lettee K, page 133.
Execution of the Douglases.

The Douglases, along with their un­
fortunate friend and adherent Malcolm
Fleming, were beheaded, according to
Gray’s MS., “ in vigilio Sancte Katerine
Virginis—viz, xxiiii. die mensis Novem­
bris anno Domini I^m iiii^c XL. “ The date
in the Extracta ex Yeteribus Chronicis
Scotiæ agrees with this ; but it appears,
from the following curious instrument,
that Malcolm Fleming was executed,
not at the same time as the Douglases,
but on the fourth day thereafter:—In
Dei nomine Amen. Per hoc presens
publicum instrumentum cunctis pateat
evidenter quod anno ab incarnacione Do­
mini, secundum computacionem Regni
Scocie M^mo cccc^mo xl^mo mensis Januarii
die vii. Indictione quarta Pontificatus
Sanctissime in Xpo patris et Domini
nostri, Domini Eugenii divina provi­
dentia Papæ quarti Anno x^mo. In mei
Notarii publici et testium subscripto-
rum presencia personaliter constitut.
Nobiles viri Walterus de Buchqwhanane
et Thomas de Murhede scutiferi, ac pro­
curatores nobilis viri Roberti Flemyng
scutiferi, filii et heredis Malcolmi Fle­
myng quondam Domini de Bigar, hab­
entes ad infrascripta potestaten et suffi­
ciens mandatum, ut meipso notario
constabat per legitima documenta, acce­
dentes ad Crucem fori Burgi de Lithgw,
coram Willmo de Howstoun deputato
Vicecomitis ejusdem, procuratorio no­
mine dicti Roberti, falsaverunt quoddam
judicium datum seu prelatum super
Malcolmum Flemyng, patrem dicti
Roberti, super montem Castri de Edyn­
burch, Secundum modum et formam,
et propter racionem inferius scriptum,
quarum tenor sequitur in wulgar.

We, Waltyr of Buchqwanane and
Thomas of Murhede, speciale procura-
tors and actournais, conjunctlyand seve­
rally, to Robert Flemying, son and ayr
to Malcolm Flemying, sumtyme Lord
of Bigar, sayis to thee, John of Blayr
Dempstar, that the Doyme gyfiin out of
thy mouth on Malcolm Flemying in a
said Courte haldyn befor our soverane

Lorcl y^e King on the Castle-hill of Edyn
burch, on Mononday the acht and twenty
day of the moneth of November the yere
of our Lord M^mo cccc^mo and fourty zeris
sayande “ that he had forfat land, lyff.
and gud as chete to the King, and tha
yow gave for doyme ;" that doyme for
said giffyn out of thy mouth is evyl, fals,
and rotten in itself ; and here We, the
foresaid Walter and Thomas, procura-
tors to the said Robert for hym, and in
his name, fals it, adnull it, and again
cancel it in thy hand William of How­
ston Deput to the Sherray of Lithgow,
and tharto a borch in thy hand; and
for this cause the Courte was unlach
full, the doyme unlachfull, unorderly
gyffn, and agane our statut; f or had he
been a common thef takyn redhand
and haldyn twa Sonys, he sulde haff had
his law dayis he askande them, as he dic
before our Soverane Lord the King, anc
be this resoune the doyme is evyll giffyn
and weil agane said; and her we, the
foresaid Walter and Thomas, procura-
tors to the foresaid Robert, protests for
ma resounys to be giffyn up be the said
Robert, or be his procurators qwhar he
acht, in lawfull tyme.

Dictum judicium sic ut premittitur
falsatum et adnullatum dicti procurato-
ris, nomine dicti Roberti, invenerunt
plegium ad prosequendum dictas adnul­
laciones et falsaciones predicti judicii,
in manu Roberti Nicholson serjandi
domini nostri regis qui dictum plegium
recepit. Postmodo vero dicti procura-
tores offerebant falsacionem adnullacio-
nem dicte judicii sub sigillo præfati
Roberti Flemyng dicto Willelmo de
Howstoun deputato dicti vicecomitis,
qui recipere recusavit, dicendo quod
recepcio Ejusdem pertinebat ad Justi­
ciarium, et non ad vicecomitum, et tunc
ipsi procuratores continuo pubhce pro­
testati sunt, quod dicta recusacio nul­
lum prejudicium dicto Roberto Flemyng
generaret in futurum. Super quibus
omnibus et singulis præfati Walterus et
Thomas procuratorio nomine ut supra
a me notario publico infrascript sibi
äeri pecierunt publicum instrumentum,
seu publica instrumenta:

Acta fuerunt haec apud crucem ville
de Lithgw hora qû decima ante meridiem
Anno, die, mense, Indiccione et Ponti­
ficatu quibus supra, presentibus ibidem
providis viris, Willelmo de Houston
Deputato ut supra, Domino Willmo
llane, Domino Johanne person, Pres­
byteris, Jacobo Forrest et Jacobo Fowlys
publico notario cum multis aliis testi­

NOTES AND ILLUSTRATIONS. 383

bus, ad premissa vocatis specialiter et
rogatis.

This instrument, which exhibits in a
striking light the formal solemnity of
feudal mannery, is printed from a copy
communicated to me by my friend
Thomas Thomson, Esq., Depute-clerk
Register, and taken from the original
in the archives of the Earldom of Wig­
town, preserved in the charter-chest of
Admiral Fleming at Cumbernauld.

Letter L, page 141.
Early Connexion between Scotland and
the Hanse Towns.

The intercourse of Scotland with the
Hanse towns and the commercial states
of Flanders took place, as has been
shewn in another part of this history, at
a very early period. When that portion
of the work was written, I was not
aware of the existence of an interesting
document on the subject of early Scot­
tish commerce, which had been included
by Sartorius in his work on the origin
of the league of the Hanse towns ; for
the publication of which, after the
death of the author, the world is in­
debted to the learned Dr Lappenberg
of Hamburg; and to which my atten­
tion was first directed by Mr J. D.
Carrick’s Life of Sir William Wallace,
published in Constable’s Miscellany.
The document is a letter from Wallace
and Sir Andrew Moray, dated at Bad­
sington in Scotland, evidently a mis­
reading for Haddington, on the 11th of
October 1297. It is as follows :—

“Andreas de Morauia et Willelmus
Wallensis, duces exercitus regni Scotie
et communitas eiusdem Regni, prouidis
viris et discretis ac amicis dilectis,
maioribus et communibus de Lubek et
de Hamburg salutem et sincere dilec­
tionis semper incrementum. Nobis per
fide dignos mercatores dicti regni Scotie
est intimatum, quod vos vestri gratia,
in omnibus causis et negociis, nos et
ipsos mercatores tangentibus consulen-
tes, auxiliantes et favorabiles estis, licet,
nostra non precesserenfc merita, et ideo
magis vobistenemur ad grates cum digna
remuneracione, ad que vobis volumus
obligari; rogantes vos, quatinus pre­
conizari facere velitis inter mercatores
vestros, quod securum accessum ad
omnes portus regni Scotie possint ha­
bere cum mercandiis suis, quia regnum
Scotie, Deo regraciato, ab Anglorum
potestate bello est recuperatum. Va­
lete. Datum apud Badsingtonam in

Scotia, undecimo die Octobris, Anno
gracie, millesimo ducentesimo nonagesi-
mo septimo. Rogamus vos insuper vt
negocia Johannis Burnet, et Johannis
Frere, mercatorum nostrorum promoueri
dignemini, prout nos negocia mercato-
rum vestrorum promovere velitis. Va­
lete dat: ut prius.”

The original letter, of which a tran­
script was communicated by Dr Lappen­
berg, the editor of Sartorius’s work, to
Mr Carrick, through Mr Repp, one of
the assistant librarians of the Faculty
of Advocates, is still preserved among
the archives of the Hanseatic city of
Lubeck. “ It appears,” says Dr L. “ to
be the oldest document existing relative
to the intercourse of Hamburg and
Lubeck, or other Hanseatic cities, with
Scotland.” It is much to be wished that
a correct fac-simile of it should be pro­
cured. The battle of Stirling, in which
Wallace defeated Cressingham, was
fought on the 3d of September 1297.
A great dearth and famine then raged
in Scotland, and Wallace led his army
into England.¹ The letter to the cities
of Lubeck and Hamburg was evidently
written on the march into Northumber-
land, which corroborates the reading of
Haddington, a town lying directly in
the route of the army, for Badsington,
a name unknown to Scottish topography.
In Langtoft’s Chronicle, a high author­
ity, we meet with a corroboration of
Wallace’s mission to Flanders, immedi­
ately after the battle of Stirling :—

After this bataile, the Scottis sent over the se
A boye of ther rascaile, quaynt and dèguise²
To Flandres bad him fare, through burgh and
cite,

Of Edward where he ware to bryng them cer
teynte.³

It is probable thafc this boy or page,
who was sent to spy out the motions of
Edward, was the bearer of the letter to
the cities of Lubeck and Hamburg.
We possess now four original deeds
granted by Wallace : The above letter
to Lubeck and Hamburg—the protec­
tion to the monks of Hexham, dated the
8th of November 1297—the passport to
the same monks—and the famous grant,
published by Anderson in his Diplomata,
plate xliv., to Alexander Skirmishur, of
the office of Constable of the castle of
Dundee, for his faithful service, in
bearing the royal standard in the army
of Scotland. It is curious to mark the
progressive style used by Wallace in

¹ Eordun a Goodal, vol. ii. pp. 171, 172.

² Disguised. ³ Langtoft, vol. ii. p. 298.

384  HISTORY OF SCOTLAND.

these deeds. In the first, the letter to
the Hanse Towns, dated 11th October
1297, it is simply commander of the
army of Scotland, “ Dux exercitus regni
Scotiæ.” In the second, dated 7th Nov­
ember 1297, he is “ Leader of the army
of Scotland, in the name of an illustrious
prince, Lord John, by the grace of God,
King of Scotland, by the consent of the
community of the same kingdom,”¹ In
the third, which is dated at Torphichen,
the 29th March 1298, we no longer find
Andrew Moray associated in the com­
mand of the army with Wallace ; his
style is simply William Wallace, Guar­
dian of the Kingdom of Scotland, and
leader of the armies of the same, in the
name of an excellent prince, Lord John,
by the grace of God, the illustrious
King of Scotland.

With the exception of this valuable
document, I am not aware that there
exist any additional letters or charters
relative to the early commerce between
Scotland and the Hanse towns, till we
arrive at the first quarter of the fifteenth
century, during which repeated com­
plaints were made on the part of the
associated cities, that the Scots had
plundered their merchantmen. In con­
sequence of this they resorted to re­
prisals ; the members of the league were
prohibited from all intercourse with the
Scots ; and every possible method was
adopted to persecute and oppress the
merchants of this country, wherever the
Hanseatic factories were established;
for example, in Norway, and in Flan­
ders, to which the Scots resorted. It
is ordered by a Hanse statute of the
year 1412, that no member of the league
should purchase of Scotsmen, either at
Bruges or any other place, cloth either
dressed or undressed, or manufactured
from Scottish wool; whilst the mer­
chants of the Hanse communities who
did not belong to the league, were forbid
to sell such wares in the markets of the
leagued towns. It would appear that
these quarrels continued for upwards of
ten years, as in 1418 the Compter at
Bruges was enjoined, under pain of
confiscation, to renounce commercial
intercourse with the Scots, till all dif­
ferences were adjusted ; from which we
may fairly conclude, that the Bruges
market was the principal emporium of
trade on both sides. A few years after
this, in 1426, the prohibition of all
trade with the Scots was renewed, un­

¹ Knighton, p. 2521. Apud Twysden x.
Scriptores, vol. ii,

less they consented to an indemnification
for damages already sustained. At a
still later period, in 1445, it appears
that the Bremeners had captured,
amongst other vessels, a ship coming
from Edinburgh, laden with a cargo of
cloth and leather ; and in the course of
the same year, a commission was issued
by James the Second, to certain Scottish
delegates, empowering them to enter
into negotiations with the towns of
Bremen, Lubeck, Hamburg,. Wismar,
Stralsund and Kostock, regarding the
termination of all such disputes. The
original commission, which has never
been printed in any English work, is
preserved in the archives of the city
of Bremen, and is to be found m a
rare German pamphlet, or Thesis, which
was discovered and communicated by
Sir William Hamilton to Mr Thomson,
to whom I am indebted for the use of
it. It is as follows :—

" Jacobus Dei gratia Bex Scotorum.
Universis ad quorum noticiam presentes
literæ pervenerint, salutem. Sciatis
quod nos ex matura deliberatione nostri
parliamenti, de fide et legalitate delec­
torum, et fidelium nostrorum, Thome
de Preston, scutiferi et familiaris nostri
Johannis Jeffrason et Stephani Huntare,
cumburgensium burgi nostri de Edin­
burgh, ac Andree Ireland, burgensis
burgi nostri de Perth, plurimum confi­
dentes, ipsos, Thomam, Johannem, Ste­
phanum, ac Andream, nostros commis­
sarios, deputatos, et nuncios speciales
fecimus, constituimus, et ordinavimus.
Danteš et concedentes eisdem Thome,
Johanni, Stephano, et Andree, et eorum,
duobus, conjunctim, nostram plenariam
potestatem et mandatum speciale ad
comparendum coram nobilibus et cir­
cumspecte prudentie viris burgimastris,
Scabinis et consulibus civitatum, vil­
larum, et oppidorum de Lubec, Bremen,
Hamburg, Wismere, Trailsond, et Bos­
tock, seu ipsorum et aliorum, quorum
interest commissariis et deputatis suf­
ficientem potestatem habentibus, ad
communicandum, tractandum, concor­
dandum, componendum, appunctuan-
dum, et finaliter concludendum, de et
super spoliatione, bonorum restitutione,
lesione et interfectione regni nostri Mer­
catorum per Bremenses anno revoluto
in mare factorum, et perpetratorum, ac
literas quittancie pro nobis et dictis
nostris mercatoribus dandi et conce­
dendi, ac omnia alia, ac singula faciendi,
gerendi et exercendi, que in premissis
necessaria fuerint, seu opportuna. Ba­

NOTES AND ILLUSTRATIONS. 385

tum et gratum habentes, pro perpetuo
habituri quicquid dicti nostri commissarii
vel eorum duo conjunctim in premissis
duxerint faciendum. Datum sub magno
sigillo nostro apud Edynburgh, decimo
quarto die mensis Augusti, anno domini
millesimo quadragintesimo quadragesi-
mo quinto, et regni nostri nono.”

In consequence of this commission,
the following treaty, included in the
same rare tract, was entered into on the
16th October 1445. It is drawn up in
an ancient dialect of Low German, still
spoken in those parts. Eor its trans­
lation—a work which I believe few
scholars in this country could have per­
formed—I am indebted to the kindness
and learning of my friend Mr Leith.

Letter of the Scottish ambassadors
concerning the reconciliation
of the town of bremen with the
subjects of the kingdom of scot­
land, and the treating of the
damage which they had occa­
sioned each other.

“We, John Jeffreson, Stephen Hunter,
provost of Edinburgh, and Andrew Ire­
land, bailie of Perth, ambassadors and
procurators plenipotentiary of our most
gracious beloved master, the most illus­
trious prince and lord, James king
of Scots, of the noble city of Edin­
burgh, and others of his towns and sub­
jects, acknowledge and make known
openly in this letter, and give all to
understand, who shall see it, or hear it
read.

“ Since those of Bremen, in years but
lately past, took on the sea, from the
subjects of the afore-mentioned most
powerful prince and lord, the King of
Scots, our gracious beloved lord, a cer­
tain ship, laden with Scottish cloth, and
in order that all capture, attack, and
damage, which have happened to ships,
people, or goods, wherever they have
taken place, and that all other clamage
which has happened to the kingdom of
Scotland, and the subjects of the said
kingdom, on the part of those of Bre­
men, or their people, up to the date of
this letter, may be removed :

“And also, in order to compensate
for, to diminish, and extinguish, any
great and remarkable damage which
they of Bremen have suffered and re­
ceived in former years and times, from
the subjects of the afore-mentioned lord
the king :

“Therefore, have we, the above­
vol. ii,

mentioned John, Stephen, and An­
drew, by the grace, full powers, and
command of our afore-mentioned gra­
cious and beloved lord the king, a,nd
others of his towns and subjects, pro­
curators plenipotentiary, (according to
the contents of all their procuratories,
together with that of his royal gracious
majesty, sealed with all their seals,
which we have delivered over to the
afore-mentioned people of Bremen, and
received answer,) negotiated, effected,
and made conditions of a friendly
treaty, with the honourable burger­
meister and counsellors of Bremen, in
all power, and in the manner as here­
after is written.

“ Although the afore-mentioned peo­
ple of Bremen, in strict right, as also
on account of the delay which has
taken place, and also on account of the
great damage which they have suffered
in former years from the said kingdom,
could not be bound, and were not
bound, yet on account of their affection
to, and to please the afore-mentioned,
our most gracious lord, and his royal
grace, and for the sake of peace, and
an equitable treaty, the same people of
Bremen, to compensate for the expense,
wear, and great inconvenience, which
then was occasioned, have given us, and
do presently give a Butse,¹ called the
Rose, with anchors, tackling, and ropes,
as she came out of the sea, and there­
unto forty measures of beer ; and there­
with shall all attack, damage, and
hurt, which they of Bremen and their
allies have done to the kingdom of
Scotland, and the subjects of the said
kingdom, up to the date of this letter,
whether the damage may have been
done to crews, goods, or ships, and
wherever the damage may have been
received, be declared to be compen­
sated for, acquitted, and completely
forgiven.

“ And, in like manner also, shall all
attack, damage, and hurt, which they
of Bremen, in these years, have suf-
fered from the kingdom of Scotland,
and the subjects of the said kingdom,
and particularly that which happened
to one of their coggen² which was lost

¹ Butse, a particular kind of ship. Herving
busses is a term frequently used in the Acts
of Parliament.

² Coggen, another kind of ship, of some
particular build, used for warlike as well as
for mercantile purposes. Kreyer and kreyger
oan only be explained in the same general
way.

386 HISTORY OF SCOTLAND.

in the Firth, and to a kreyer lost near
Wytkopp, and to a kreyger lost near
the Abbey of Arbroath, and other ships,
which damage those of Bremen esti­
mated, and said they had suffered, to
the amount of six thousand nobles, the
same shall also be held acquitted and
compensated for.

“ And we, the above-mentioned John,
Stephen, and Andrew, procurators
plenipotentiary, by power and grace of
our gracious lord the king, his towns,
and subjects, and according to the con­
tents of our procuratories, do acquit,
and have acquitted all and each one of
the afore-mentionecl persons of Bremen,
and their allies, by power and might of
this letter, of all the afore-mentioned
damage and attacks, let it have hap­
pened when and where it will, and
wherever it may have been received, in
all time afore this, and will never revive
the same complaints, either in spiritual
or secular courts.

“ Furthermore is agreed, negotiated,
and settled, that if it should be that
the subjects and merchants of the above­
mentioned kingdom, should ship any
of their goods in bottoms belonging to
powers hostile to Bremen, and the pri­
vateers¹ of Bremen should come up to
them on the sea, so shall the above­
mentioned Scots and their goods be
unmolested, with this difference—if it
should be that enemy’s goods were in
the ship, such goods shall they, on their
oaths, deliver over to those of Bremen;
and the ship, crew, and freight shall be
held to ransom for a certain sum of gold,
as they shall agree with the allies² of
those of Bremen, and these shall allow
the ship, with the crew and the goods
of the Scots, to sail away to their de­
stined market. And further, shall all
the subjects and merchants of the
above-mentioned most mighty prince
ancl lord, the King of Scots, our most
gracious and beloved master, as also
those of Bremen and their merchants,
visit, touch at, and make use of the
ports and territory of the said kingdom
of Scotland, and of the said town and
territory of Bremen, with their mer­
chant vessels, velinqen,³ lifes, and
merchandise, with security, and under
good safe-conduct, and velichkeit,⁴ as
they have been used to do in peace and
love for long years before.

“For the greater authenticity and
truth of this document, have we, John
¹ Redliggere. ² Vrunden.
³ Unknown. ⁴ Unknown.

Jeffreson, Stephen Hunter, and Andrew
Ireland, ambassadors and procurators
plenipotentiary, affixed our true seals
to this letter.

“Given and written after the birth
of Christ our Lord, fourteen hundred
ycars, and thereafter in the fortieth
and fifth, on the day of St Gall, the
holy abbot, (d. 16 Oct.)”

Lettee M, page 161.
James, ninth Earl of Douglas.
As this authentic and interesting
document has never been published,
it may properly be included amongst
the Notes and Illustrations of this his­
tory. It is taken from the manuscript
volume preserved in the Library of the
Faculty of Advocates at Edinburgh,
entitled, “Sir Lewis Stewart’s Collec­
tions,” a 4, 7, p. 19.

Appoyntement betwixt James II. and
James Earle Douglas.
Be it kend till all men be thyr pre­
sent letters, me James, Earle of Doug­
las, to be halden and obleist, and be
thir present letters, and the faith in my
body, lelie ancl truelie binds and obliges
me till our sovereane Lord James, be
the grace of God, King of Scotland, that
I shall fulfill, keep, and observe all and
sundrie articles, and condeciones, and
poyntis underwrittin. That is to say—
in the first, I bind and oblige me till
our said soverayne lord, that I shall
never follow nor persew, directly nor
indirectly, be law, or any other maner
of way, any entrie in the lands of the
earldome of Wigtone, with the pairti­
nents or any part of them, untill the
tyme that I may obtaine speciall favour
and leicence of oure soverayne Lady
Mary, be the grace of God, Queen of
Scotland, be letter and seal to be given
and maid be hir to me thairupon. And
in the samen wise, I bind and obliss me
to our soverayne lord, that I shall never
persew nor follow, directly nor indi­
rectlie, the lands of the lordshipe of
Stewartoun, with the pertinents, or any
pairt of them, the whilk wer whilum
the Dutches of Turinies, until the time
that I may obtaine our soverayne lord’s
special licence, grace, and favour of en­
trie in the said lands; and alswa, I bind
and oblidge me till our soverayne lord,
to remitt and forgive, and be thir pre­
sent letters fullie remitts and forgives,
for evermair, for me, my brother, and
the Lord Hamiltoune, and our (enver­

NOTES AND ILLUSTRATIONS. 387

da,nce) all maner of rancour of heart,
malicc, fede, malgre, and invy, the
quhilk I or any of us ha,d, hes, or may
have in tyme to come, till any of our
said soverane lord’s lieges, for any ac­
tions, causes, or querrels bygane, and
speciallie till all them that had arte or
parte of the slaughter or deid of whylum
William, Earle of Douglas, my brother,
and shall take thay personnes in heart­
lines and friendship at the ordinance
and advyce of our said soverayne lord.

And outter, I bind and obliss me till
our said soverayne lord, that all the
tenants and maillers being within my
lands quatsomever, sall remane with
thair tacks and maling quhile Whitson-
day come a year, except them that oc­
cupies the grangis and steids whilk war
in the hand of the said Earle William,
my brother, for his own proper goods
the tyme of his decease, and yet thay
persones to remaine with thyr tacks,
at our said soverayne lord’s will, of the
said granges and steids while Whitson-
day next to come; and alswa I bind and
oblige me to our said soverayne lord to
revock, and be thir present letters re­
vocks, all leagues and bands, if any hes
been made be me in any tyme bygane,
contrare to our said soverayne lord; ancl
binds and obliss me, that I shall make
na band, na ligg in tyme coming, quhilk
sall be contrar til his hienes. Alswa I
bind and obliss me till our said sove­
rayne lord, to remitt and forgive, and be
thir present letters remitts and forgives
till his hienes all maner of maills, goods
spendit, taken, sould, or analied be him
or his intromitters, in any manner of
wayes before the xxii day of the moneth
of July last bypast, before the makyng
of thir present letters. And if any thing
be tane of the good of Gallaway, I put
me thairof, to our said soveraigne lady,
the Queen’s will. Alswa I bind and ob­
lige me to our said soveraigne lord, that
I shall maintaine, supplie, and defend
the borders and the bordarars, and keep
the trewes taken, or to be taken, at all
my guidly power, and in als far as I
aught to do as wardane or liegeman till
him. Alswa I bind and oblidge me to
doe to our said soverane lord, honor and
worschip in als far as lyes in my power,
I havand sic sovertie as I can be content
of reasoun for safety of my life. Item,
I oblige me that all harmes done, ancl
guides taken under assurance be mandit
and restored. In witness of the whilk
thing, in fulfilling and keeping all and
sundrie articles, poynts, and conditiones

beforr written in all manier of forme,
force, and effect, as is aforsaid, all
fraud and guile away put, I the said
James, for me, my brother, and the
Lord Hamiltoune, and all our pairts,
(averdance,) to ther present letters sett
my seall, and for the mair sickerness the
haly evangillis twichit, hes given our
bodily oath, and subscryved with my
own hand at Douglas, the xxviii day of
the month of Agust, the year of our
Lord jm. four hundreth and feftie-twa
years.

Sic subscribitur,
James, Earle Douglas.
James, Loed Hamiltone.

Sir Lewis Stewart does not say where
the original is preserved ; but his trans­
cript is evidently much altered and mo­
dernised in the spelling.

Letteb N, page 165.

“ Eodem anno Comes Moraviæ frater
Comitis de Dowglas cum fratre suo
Comite de Ormont, et Johannes Doug­
las eorundem fratre intraverunt Anan­
derdaill et illam depredati sunt; et
spolia ad matrem in Karleil portarunt,
presentantes. Quibus (dominus) de
Johnston cum cluceutis occurrit, et
acriter inter illos pugnatum est. In
quo conflictu dominus Comes Moraviæ
occiditur, et caput ejus regi Jacobo pre­
sentabatur, sed rex animositatem viri
commendabat, licet caput ignorabat.
Occisus eciam fuit Comes de Ormont.
Tunc convocato Parliamento annexæ
erant illorum terræ, Coronæ regiæ, viz.
Ettrick forest, tota Galvaia, Ballincreiff,
Gifford, cum aliis multis dominiis Eor­
undem.”

The manuscript from which this ex­
tract is taken, and which has never been
printed, is preserved in the Library of
the University of Edinburgh. A. C. c. 26.

Letter 0, page 195.
Hise of the Power of the Boyds.

The remarkable indenture quoted in
the text is preserved amongst the arch­
ives of the earldom of Wigtown, in the
charter-chest of Admiral Fleming at
Cumbernauld.

As only twenty copies of it, printed
for private circulation, exist, I am happy
to render it more accessible to the Scot­
tish antiquary. It is as follows :—

“Yis indentour, mad at Striuelyn,
the tend day of februar, the zer of God

388 HISTORY OF SCOTLAND.

a thousand four hundreth sixty and fyf
zeris, betwyx honourable and worschip-
ful lordis, yat is to say, Robert, Lord
Flemyng on ye ta pairt, and Gilbert,
Lord Kennedy and Sir Alexander Boid
of Duchal, knight, on the todir pairt,
yat yai ar fullelie accordit and appointit
in maner and form as eftir follouis :
Yat is to say, yat ye said lordis ar bundyn
und oblist yaim selfis, yair kyn, friendis,
and men, to stand in afald kendnes,
supple, and defencs, ilk an til odir, in
all yair caussis and querrell leifull and
honest, movit and to be movit, for all
ye dais of yair liffis, in contrery and
aganis al maner of persones yat leiff or
dee may ; yair allegiance til our soueran
lord alanerly outan, excepand to the
lord flemyng, his bandis mad of befoir,
to ye Lord Levynston, and to yhe lorcl
Hamilton, and, in lyk maner, excepand
to the saidis lordis kennedy and Sir
Alexander, yair bandis macl of befoir,
til a reverend fadir in Crist, master
patrik the graham, bischop of Sanc­
tander, ye Erle af Crawford, ye lord
mungumer, the lord maxvel, the lord
boid, the lord levynston, the lord ham­
ilton, and the lord Cathcart. Item, yat
the said lord flemyng salbe of special
service, and of cunsail to the kyng, als
lang as the saidis lordis kenedy and Sir
Alexancler ar speciall seruandis and of
cunsail to ye kyng; the said lord flem­
yng kepand his band and kyndnes to the
foirsaidis lord kennedey and Alexander,
for al the foirsaid tym: And attour, the
said lord flemyng is oblist yat he sal
nodir wit, consent, nor assent, til, (avas,)
nor tak away the kyngis person fra the
saidis lord kenedy and Sir Alexander,
nor fra na udyr yat yai leff, and ordanis
to be doaris to yaim, and keparis in yair
abcens; and gif the said lorcl flemyng
getis, or may get, ony bit of sic thyng
to be done in ony tym, he sal warn the
saiclis lord kennedy and Sir Alexander,
or yair doars in do tym, or let it to be
done at all his power; and tak sic part
as yai do, or on an of yaim for ye tymin,
ye ganstandyng of yat mater, but fraucl
and gil; and the said lord fleming sal
adwis the kyng at al his pertly power
wycht his gud cunsail, to be hertly and
kyndly to the foirsaidis lord kenedy and
Sir Alexander, to yair barnis and friendis,
and yai at belang to yaim for ye tym.
Item, giff yair happynis ony vakand to
fall in the kyngis handis, at is a reson­
able and meit thyng for the said lord
flemyngis seruice, yat he salbe furdirit
yairto for his reward: and gif yair hap­

pynis a large thyng to fal, sic as varct,
releiff, marriage, or offis, at is meit for
hym, the said lord flemyng sal haff it
for a resonable compocicion befoir udir.
Item, the saidis lord kennedy and Sir
Alexander sal haff thom of Sumerwel
and wat of twedy, in special mantenans,
supple, and defencs, in all yair accionis,
causs, and querrel, leful and honest, for
the said lord flemyngis sak, and for yair
seruis don and to be don, next yair
awyn mastiris, yat yai wer to of befoir.
And, at all and sundry thyngis abovn
writtyn salbe lelily kepit, bot fraud and
gil, ather of yhe pairtis hes geffyn till
udiris, yair bodily aithis, the hali evan­
gelist tuychit, and enterchangable, set
to yair selis, at day, yheir, and place
abovn written.”

Letter P, p. 222, and Q, p. 227.
Revolt of his Nobility against James the
Third, in 1482.
The history of this revolt of the nobles
against James the Third, as it is found
in the pages of Lesley and Buchanan,
furnishes a striking example of the
necessity of having access to the con­
temporary muniments and state papers
of the period, as the materials from which
historical truth must be derived. Les­
ley was a scholar and a man of talent—
Buchanan a genius of the first rank of
intellect; yet both have failed in their
attempt to estimate the causes which
led to the struggle between James and
his barons; ancl it is not, perhaps, too
much to say that the narrative of Buc­
hanan, where he treats of this period,
is little else than a classical romance.
The extent of Albany’s treasonable cor­
respondence with Edward the Eourth,
his consent to sacrifice the independence
of the kingdom, his actual assumption
of the title of king, and the powerful
party of the nobles by whom he Avas
supported, are all of them facts un­
known to this historian, ancl which the
publicationof the “Fœdera Angliæ“ first
revealed to the world. Instead of these
facts, which let us into the history of
the proceedings of both parties in the
state, and afford a pretty clear notion of
the motives by which they were actu­
ated, we are presented by Buchanan
with a series of vague ancl scandalous
reports, calculated to blacken the me­
mory of the king, arising at first out of
the falsehoods propagated by Albany
and the nobles of his faction, against
the monarch whom they had deter­

NOTES AND ILLUSTRATIONS. 389

mined to dethrone, increased by the
credulous addifcions of the common peo­
ple, and invested by him with all the
charms of style which his sweet and
classic muse has so profusely scattered
over his history. “ Hae quidem in acta
publica causæ sunfc redactæ. Verum
odium regis ob causam privatam con­
ceptum plus ei (i. e. Domino Crichtonio)
nocuisse creditur. Erat Gulielmo uxor
e nobile Dumbarorum familia nata, ab­
que insigni pulchritudine. Eam cum a
rege maritus corruptam comperisset,
cousilium temerarium quidem sed ab
auimo amore ægro et injuria irritato non
alienum suscepit. Minorem enim e
regis sororibus, et ipsam quoque forma
egregia et consuetudine fratris infamem,
compressit, et ex ea Margaritam Crich­
tonium quæ non adeo pridem decessifc
genuit.” B. xii. cli. For this compli­
cated tale, which throws the double
guilt of adultery and incest upon the
unfortunate monarch, there is no evi­
dence whatever ; and of the first part of
it, the inaccuracy may be detected.
William, third Lord Crichton, did not
marry a daughter of the noble house of
Dunbar. The Lady Janet Dunbar was
his mother, not his wife. (Douglas’s
Peerage, vol. i. p. 609. Crawford’s Ofli­
cers of State, p. 311. Sutherland case,
by Lord Hailes, c. vi. p. 81.) On the
other hand, it seems almost certain that
William, third Lord Crichton, the asso
ciate of Albany, of whom Buchanan is
speaking, did marry Margaret, sister to
James the Third ; but the dark asper
sion of her previous connexion with
her brother the king, is found, as far
as I have yet seen, in no historian prior
to Buchauan, not even in the credulous
Boece, whose pages are sufficiently hos­
tile to James the Third, to induce us to
believe that the story would not have
been neglected. That the treaty of
Albany with Edward the Fourth, and
his assumption of the royal title, should
have been unknown to Buchanan and
Lesley, to whom all access to the ori­
ginal records was probably impossible
at the time they wrote, is not extraor-
dinary ; but it is singular that the cir­
cumstances illustrative of this period of
our history should have escaped the
notice of Mr Aikman, the latest trans­
lator of Buchanan. As to Lesley, the
causes which he assigns for the hostility
of the nobility to James and his favour­
ites, are his having suffered Cochrane
to debase the current coin, by the issue
of copper money, unmeet to have course

in the realm—the consequent dearth
and famine throughout the country—
his living secluded from his queen and
his nobles, and his entertaining, in place
of his royal consort, a mistress, named
the Daisy—the slaughter of the Earl of
Mar, his brother—and the banishment
of the Duke of Albany. With regard
to the first of these subjects of com­
plaint, the issue of a new copper coin,
the fact is certain, and the discontent
and distress which it occasioned cannot
be doubted. In the short Chronicle at
the end of Winton’s MS. Reg. 17, d. xx.,
printed by Pinkerton, Appendix, vol. i.
p. 502, Hist. of Scotland, is the follow­
ing passage :—“ Thar was ane gret hun­
gyr and deid in Scotland, for the boll of
meill was for four pounds; for thair
was black cunye in the realm strikin
and ordynit be King James the Thred,
half pennys, and three penny pennys
innumerabill, of copper. And thai yeid
twa yier and mair : And als was gret
weir betwix Scotland and England, and
gret distruction thro the weiris was of
corne and cattel. And thai twa thyngs
causyt bayth hungar and derth, and
mony puir folk deifc of hunger. And
that samyn yeir, in the moneth of July,
the Kyng of Scotland purposyt till haif
passifc on gaitwart Lawdyr : and thar
the Lords of Scotland held thair coun­
saill in the Kirk of Lawdyr, and cryit
doune the black silver, and thai slew
ane pairt of the Kyng’s housald ; and
other part thai banysyt; and thai tuke
the Kyng himself, and thai put hym in
the Castell of Edinburgh in firm kepyng.
. . . . And he was haldyn in the
Castell of Edynburgh fra the Magda­
lyne day quhill Michaelmas. And than
the wictall grew better chaip, for the
boll that was for four pounds was than
for xxii. sh. of quhyt silver. “ The circum­
stance of crying down the black money is
corroborated by the act passed in the par­
liament of 1473, c. 12, “and as touching
the plakkis and the new pennys, the
lordis thinkis that the striking of thame
be cessit. And they have the course
that they now have unto the tyme that
the fynance of them be knawin. And
whether they halde five shillings fyne
silver of the unce, as was ordainit by
the King’s hieness, and promittet by
the cunzeours.”¹ So far the narrative
of Lesley is supported by authentic evi­
dence, but that Cochrane was the ad­
viser of this depreciation of the current
1 Acts of the Parliament of Scotland, vol,
ii. p. 105.

390 HISTORY OF SCOTLAND.

coin does not appear in any contem­
porary record; and the assertion of
James’s attachment to a mistress, called
the Daisy, who had withdrawn his affec­
tions from the queen, rests solely on the
authority of the later and more popular
historians.

Letter R, page 245.

Inventory of the Jewels and Money of
James the Third.
As the inventory referred to in the
text is valuable, from the light which it
throws upon the wealth and the man­
ners of Scotland at the close of the
fifteenth century, I am sure the anti­
quarian, and I trust even the general
reader, will be gratified by its insertion.
It is extracted from the accounts of the
Lord High Treasurer of Scotland, and a
fcw copies have been already printed,
although not published, by Mr Thom­
son, to whom this volume is under re­
peated obligations, and who will not be
displeased by its curious details being
macle more generally accessible to the
public.

inventare of ane parte of the gold
and silver, cunyeit and uncunyeit,
jowellis, and uther stuff, perten­
ing to umquhile oure soverane
Lordis fader, that he had in de­
pois the tyme of his deceis, and
that come to the handis of our
soverane lord that now is.

m.cccc.lxxxviii.

Memorandum deliuerit be dene Ro­
bert hog channoune of halirudhouse to
the thesaurar, tauld in presens of the
chancellar, lord Lile, the prior of Sanc­
tandrois, in a pyne pig¹ of tynn.

In the fyrst of angellis twa hundreth

four score & v angellis
Item in ridaris nyne score and aucht

ridaris

Item in rialis of France fyfty and four
Item in unicornis nyne hundrethe &

four score
Item in demyis & Scottis crounis four

hundreth & tuenti
Item in rose nobilis fyfti and four
Item in Hari nobilis & salutis fourti &

ane

Item fyftene Flemis ridaris
Item tuelf Lewis

¹ Pyne Pig; pcrhaps our modern Scots
’’penny pig.”

Item in Franche crounis thre score and
thre

Item in unkennyt² golde —--thretti

pundis

Memorandum, be the command of the
king, thar past to the castell to see the
jowalis, silver money, & uther stuff, the
xvii day of Junii, the yer of god one
thousand four hundreth and eighty­
eight yeris, thir persouns under writtin.
that is to say

The erle of Angus
The erle of Ergile
The bischope of Glasgw
The lord Halis
The lord Home

The knycht of Torfichane thesaurar

Memorandum, fund be the saidis pcr­
sonis in the blak kist, thre cofferis, a
box, a cageat.³

Item funcl in the maist of the said
cofiteris, lous & put in na thing, bot
liand within the said coffyr, fyve
hundreth, thre score ten rois nobilis,
and ane angell noble

Item in a poik of canves, beand within
the said coffre, of angell nobilis, sevin
hundreth and fyfty angelis

Item in alitillpurs, within the said coifre,
of quarteris of rois nobilis, sevin score
nyne roi3 nobilis, a quarter of a nobill

Item in a little coffre, beand within the
said coffre, of rois nobilis sevin hun­
dreth fyfty & thre nobilis

Item in a litill payntit coffre, beand
within the said blak kist, of Henry
nobilis a thousand thre hundreth,
and sevintene nobillis

Item in ane uther coffre, beand within
the said blak kist, a poik of canves,
with demyis contenand aucht hun­
clreth, ane less

Item in a box, beand within the said
blak kist, the grete bedis of gold,
contenand six score twa beclis, ancl a
knop

Item in the said box, a buke of gold

like ane tabell, and on the glasp of it,

four pcrlis, and a fare ruby
Item in the said box the grete diamant,

with the diamantis sett about it
Item in the said box, a thing of gold

with a top like a tunnele
Item in the same box a stomok,⁴ & on

² Gold of unknown denomination.
³ Cageat—casket, Jamieson, who quotes
this inventovy.
⁴ Stomok—stomacher. Jamieson.

NOTES AND ILLUSTRATIONS. 391

it set a hert, all of precious stains, &
perle

Item in a trouch¹ of cipre tre within
the said box, a point maid of perle,
contenand xxv perle with hornis of
gold

Item twa tuthpikis of gold with a
chenye, a perle, & erepike, a moist
ball of gold, ane hert of gold, with
uther small japis ²

Item in a round buste, within the said
box, a cors of gold, with four stanis.
Item a collar of gold, twa glassis with
balme

Item in a litill paper, within the said
box, ane uche, with a diamant, twa
hornis, f our butonis horse nalis blak

Item ane uche ³ of gold, like a flour the
lis, of diamantis & thre bedis of gold,
a columbe of gold & twa rubeis.

Item in a cageat, beand within the said
blak kist, a braid chenye, a ball of
cristal

Item a purs maid of perle, in it a moist
ball,⁴ a pyn⁵ of gold, a litill chenye
of gold, a raggifc staff, a serpent toung
sett

Item in the said cageat, a lifcill coffre
of silver, oure gilt, with a litil salt­
fat⁶ and a cover

Item a mannach ⁷ of silver

Item in a small coffre, a chenye of golcl,
a hert of gold, anamelit, a brassalet
of gold, sett with precious stanis

Item a collar of gold maid with eli­
phantis and a grete hingar at it

Item sanct Michaell of gold with a perle
on his spere

Item a quhissill⁸ of gold

Item a liour the lys of gold

Item a ryng with a turcas ⁹

Item a small cors with twa pecis of
gold at it

Item a grete precious stane

Item a litil barrell maid of gold

Item twa berialis, and a grete bene

Item in a litill coffre, a grete serpcnt
toung, set with gold, perle, & pre­
cious stanis, and twa small serpent
toungis set in gold, and ane ymage of
gold

Item in ane uther coffre, beand within
the blak kyst, ane roll with ringis,
ane with a grete saffer,¹⁰ ane emmor­

¹ Trouch—a deep long box.

² Japis—playthings, trifles.

³ Uche—brooch. Not in Jamieson.
⁴ A moist ball—a musk ball.

⁵ Pyn—pin. ⁶ Saltfat—saltcellar.

⁷ Unknown ; perhaps a little man. Not in
Jamieson. ⁸ Quhissill—whistle.

⁹ Turquois. ¹⁰ Sapphire.

ant,¹¹ a stane of pillar, and ane uther
ring

Item in the same coffre ane uther roll

with ringis, ane with a grete ruby, &

ufcher iiii ringis
Item ane uther roll with ringis in it, of

thame, thre grete emmorantis, a ruby,

a diamant
Item a roll of ringis, ane emmorant, a

topas, & a diamant
Item ane uther roll of ringis, ane with a

grete turcas, and ane uther ring
Itein a roll with sevin small ringis, dia­

mantis, rubeis, & perle
Item a roll with ringis, a turcas, a stane

of pillar, & a small ring
Item a roll with ringis, a ruby, a dia­

mant, twa uther ringis, a berial¹²
Item in ane uther small coffre, within

the said blak kyst, a chenye with ane

uche, in it a ruby, a diamant, maid

like a creill
Item a brasselat of gold, with hede &

pendes¹³ of gold
Item sanct Antonis cors, and in it a dia­

mant, a ruby, and a grete perle
Item a grete ring with a topas
Item a wodward¹⁴ of gold with a dia­

mant

item ane uche of gold, maid like a rose

of diamantis
Item a kist of silver, in it a grete cors,

with stanis, a ryng, a berial hingand

at it

Item in it the grete cors of the chapell,
sett with precious stanis

Memorandum, fundin in a banclit
kist like a gardeviant,¹⁵ in the fyrst the
grete chenye of gold, contenand sevin
score sex linkis
Item thre platis of silver
Item tuelf salfatis
Item fyftene discheis ouregilfc
Item a grete gilt plate
Item twa grete bassingis ouregilt
Item four masaris,¹⁶ callit king llobert

the Brocis, with a cover
Item a grete cok maid of silvcr
Item the hede, of silver, of ane of the

coveris of masar
Item a fare diaile
Item twa kasis of knyffis
Item a pare of auld knyffis

Item takin be the smyth that opinnifc
the lokkis, in gold fourty demyis

¹¹ Emerald. ¹² Beryl.

¹³ Pendants. ¹⁴ Unknown.

¹⁵ Cabinet. Jamieson.

¹⁶ Drinking cups. An interesting item—
four drinking cups of Robert the Bruce’s.

392 HISTORY OF SCOTLAND.

Item in Inglys grotis-xxiiii li. &

the said si’lver gevin agan to the ta­
karis of hym

Item ressavit in the cloissat of Davidis
tour¹ ane haly water fat of silver,
twa boxis, a cageat tnme, a glas with
rois water, a dosoune of torchis,² king
B,obert Brucis serk ³

Memorandum, gottin in the quenis
kist, quhilk come fra Striveling, in a litill
coffre within the same, In the fyrst a
belt of crammassy⁴ hernessit with gold
& braid

Item a braid belt of blak dammas, her­

nessit with gold
Item a small belt of claith of gold, her­

nessit with gold
Item a belt of gold, unhernessit
Item twa bedis of gold
Item a litill belt of gold, hernessit with

gold

Item in a box beand within the said
kist, a collar of cassedonis, with a
grete hingar of moist, twa rubeis, twa
perlis contenand xxv small cassedonis
set in gold

Item a chenye of gold maid in fassone of
frere knottis,⁵ contenand fourti four
knottis.

Item a pare of bedis of gold contenand

fyfti and sex bedis
Item a grete cheyne of gold, contenand

of linkis thre score and a lynk
Item ane uther cheyne of gold gretar,

contenand fifti and aucht linkis
Item a frete⁶ of the quenis oure set

with grete perle, sett in fouris &

fouris

Item viii uchis of gold sett with stanis
& perle

Item tuenti hingaris of gold set with
rubeis

Item a collar of gold fassonit like roisis
anamelit

Item a serpent toung, & ane unicorne

horne, set in gold
Item a grete hingar of gold with a ruby
Item a grete ruby set in gold
Item a hingar with a diamant & a grete

perle

Item a diamant set in gold

Item a small chenye w^t ane hingar set

¹ David’s Tower, in the castle.

² Unknown ; perhaps turquoises.
³ Perhaps his mail shirt.

⁴ Crimson.

⁵ Friar’s beads.

⁶ A large hoop or ring.

with diamantis in maner of . M.

and a grete perle
Item a grete safer set in gold
Item a hert of gold with a grete perle

at it

Item a small chenye with ane hingar of

rois & diamant
Item ane hingar of gold with twa perle

without stanis
Item in a clout nyne precious stanis

unsett

Item in a box in the said kist a collar of

gold, with nynetene diamantis
Item a coller of rubeis, set with threis

of perle contcnand xxx perlis and xv

rubeis with ane hinger, a diamant,

and a grete perle
Item ane ege of gold with four grete

diamantis pointit and xxviii grete

perlis about thame
Item ane uther grete ege with viii rubeis

and xxxvi perlis grete

Item in the said kist of the quenis ane
string of grete perle contenand fyfti
& a perle, and stringis of small perle

Item twa lingattis⁷ of gold

Item sex pecis of the said chenye of
gold frere knottis

Item twa grete ringis with saferis

Item twa ringis with turcacis

Item a ring with a paddokstane with a
charnale⁸

Item a ring with a face

Item a signet & na thing in it

Item thre small ringis with rubeis

Item fyve ringis with diamantis

Item a cassit coller of gold, maid like
suannis, set in gold, with xvi rubeis,
and diamantis, and viii quhite suannis
& set with double perle

Item a grete round ball, in maner of a
chalfer, of silver ouregilt

Item a levare⁹ of silver ouregilt with a
cover

Item a cop with a cover ouregilt &
punchit

Item thre brokin gilt pecis of silver
Item thre quhite pecis, a fut & a cover

of silver ouregilt
Item a grete vice nail maid of silver
Item twa brokin platis of silver and a

dische

Item in a gardeviant in the fyrst a grete

hosterage fedder¹⁰
Item a poik of lavender
Item a buke with levis of golde with xiii

levis of gold fulye

⁷ Tngot. ⁸ A hinge. ⁹ Laver.

¹⁰ Ostrich feather.

NOTES AND ILLUSTRATIONS. 393

Item a covering of variand purpir
tarter, browdin with thrissillis & a
unicorne
Item a ruf & pendiclis of the same
Item a pare of metingis¹ for hunting
Item the surples of the robe riall
In ane uther gardeviant, in the fyrst a
lamp of silver, a corperale with a cais.
Item thre quhippis² and twa bukis

Memorandum, gotten in a box quhilk
was deliverifc be the countas of Athole,
and tauld in presens of the chancellar,
lord Lile, the prior of Sanctandrois &
the thesaurar. In the fyrst in a purs
of ledder within the said box thre hun­
dreth rois nobilis of the quhilkis thare
is vii Hari nobilis

Item in the same purs of half rois no­
billis fyve hundreth hail rois nobilis,
sextene rois nobillis

Item gottin in ane uther box, fra the
said countas, the xxi day of Junii, in
a canves poik, within the said box,
tuelf hundreth & seven angel no­
bilis³

Item in ane uther purs, of ledder,
beand in the same box, ane hundreth
angelis

Item in the same purs, thre hundreth
fyfti & sevin demyis

Memorandum, fund in a blak coffre
quhilk was brocht be the abbot of Ar­
broth, in the first the grete sarpe⁴ of
gold contenand xxv schaiffis with the
fedder betuix
Item a water pot of silver
Item a pare of curale bedis, and a grete

muste ball
Item a collar of cokkilschellis contenand

xxiiii schellis of gold
Item a bane coffre, & in it a grete cors

of gold, with four precious stanis and

a chenye of gold
Item a beid of cassedonne
Item twa braid pecis of brynt silver

bullioune

Item in a leddering purs, beand in the
said blak coffre, tuelf score & xvi
salutis

Item in the same purs thretti & sex

Lewis and half nobilis
Item in the same purs four score and

thre Franche crounis
Item in the same purs fourtene score of

ducatis, and of thame gevin to the

erle of Angus fyve score and six

ducatis

Item in the said coffre, quhilk was

¹ Hunting gloves. ² Whip.

³ Thir boxis put in the thesaurhous in the
grcte kist nerrest the windo. ⁴ Belt,

brocht be the said abbot, a litil cors
with precious stanis

Item in a blak box brocht be the said
abbot to the toune of Perth the xxvi
day of Junii, in the first, lows in the
said box, four thousand thre hundreth
and fourti demyis

Item in a purs of ledder in the said box
four hundreth tuenti & viii Lewis of
gold, and in the same purs of ledder,
of Franche crounis fyve hundreth
thre score and sex. And of thame
twa salutis and four Lewis

Item in a quhite coffre of irne deliverit
be the said abbot, thre thousand,
nyne hundreth, four score & viii an­
gelis

Memorandum, ressauit in Scone, be
the thesaurar, in presens of the bischop
of Glasgw, lord Lile, the prior of Sanct­
androis, Patrik Home, & lord Drum­
mond, the xxiii day of Junii, in Avereis
box, lous, without ony purs, a thousand
and thretti Hari nobilis

Item in a purs of ledder, within the
said box, a thousand & twenti rois
nobilis, and in the said purs fyfti &
four Hari nobilis in half Hari nobilis
Item a grete gugeoune⁵ of gold
Item thare was a writ fund in the said
box sayand, in hac boxa xii c Hari
nobilis, et in eadem boxa, xi c rois
nobilis

Thir ar the names of thame, that
wist of the said box quhen it was in the
myre

James Averi
William Patonsone
William Wallace

Item ressavit fra lang Patric Hume, &
George of Touris, xvi skore of Hare
nobelis, quhilkis tha had of a part of
the money takin be the Cuntas of
Atholl and Johne Steward

Item of the same some & money gevin
to the said Patric for his reward
- - - - fourti Hare nobilis

The Compt of schir William Knollis,
lord saint Johnnis of Jerusalem, &c.
thesaurar till our soverain lord maid afc
Edinburgh the xxiiii day of Februar,
the yer of god &c. nynte ane yeris . .

of all his ressait & expens fra the ferd
day of the moneth of Junii in the yer
of god &c. auchty and aucht yeris unto
the day of this present compt

⁵ Unknown.

394 HISTORY OF SCOTLAND.

In the first he chargis him with vii^m
v^c lxxxxvii li iiii s in gold of sex thon­
sand thre hnndreth thretty a pece of
angell nobillis ressavit be the comptar
as is contenit in the beginning of this
buke writtin with Johnne Tyriis hand,
And with ii^c xvi li iiii s in gold of ane
hundreth fourscore aucht Scottis ri­
daris, as is contenit in this sammyn
buke

And with liiii li be fifty four Fraunce
riallis of gold

And with viii^c lxxxii li be nyne hun­
dreth fourscore unicornis

And with vi^c lxvi li xiiii s iiii d in ane
thousand Scottis crownis

And with J^m iii^c xxxiii li vi s viii d in
tua thousand demyis ressauit and
gevin for a merke the pece

And with ii^m lxix li iiii s in tua thousand
nyne hundreth fifty sex demyis gevin
the pece for fourtene schillingis

And with vi^m xix li ix s in thre thou­
sand thre hundreth fifty five rose
nobillis and ane quarter, the quhilk
wer gevin for thretty sex schillings
thepece, except four hundreth that
war gevin for thretty five schillings
the pece

And with iiii^m iiii^c lxvi li viii s in tua
thousand sevin hundreth tuenty nyne
Hary nobillis gevin for thretty tua
schillingis the pece

And with x li v s in fiftene Flemis
ridaris fiftene schilling the pece

And with iiii^c xxxii li in four hun­
dreth four score Lewis and halve rose
nobillis gevin for auchtene schilling
the pece

And with iiii^c lxxxxiiii li iiii s in sevin
hundreth sex Fraunce crounis gevin
for fourtene schillingis the pece

And with xxx li in Duch gold

And with ii^c vi li viii s in tua hundreth
fifty aucht salutis gevin for sextene
schillingis the pece

And with i^c xxxix li iiii s in ane hun­
dreth seviuty four ducatis gevin for
sextene schiilingis the pece
Summa of this charge xxiiii^m v^c
xvii li x s

Letter,S, page 246.
Margaret Drummond, mistress to

James IV.
From a note of the Rev. Mr Mac­
gregor Stirling’s, in his valuable manu­
script collections on the chronology of
the reign of James the Fourth, I am
enabled to give some curious particulars

regarding this unfortunate favourite of
James the Fourth. She was daughter
of John, first Lord Drummond, and the
king seems to have become attached to
her at an early period. In his first par­
liament, 3d October 1488, she had an
allowance for dresses, (mentioned in the
text, p. 246.) She bore a daughter to
the king in 1495, as it may be presumed
from an entry in the Lord High Trea­
surer’s Books, which states that twenty­
one pounds seven shillings had been
expended on the “ Lady Mergetis doch­
ter.” In Douglas’s Peerage, vol. i. p.
51, and vol. ii. p. 361, she is mentioned
as having been poisoned in 1501. But
she appears to have been alive on 24th
June 1502, as in the Treasurer’s Books
under that date is the following entry:—
“ Item, the xxiiii day of Junii, the kyng
wes in Drummonde gifnn to Mergrett
Drummonde be the kingis commande,
twenty-one pounds. Item, to her nuriss
forty-one pounds.” It is possible, how­
ever, this may have been the king’s
daughter, not his mistress. Great mys­
tery hangs over the death of this royal
favourite, and the most minute account
is to be found in a celebrated work
where one would certainly little expect
to meet an obscure portion of Scottish
history— Moreri’s Dictionary. It is taken
from a MS. history of the family of
Drummond, composed in 1689. Speak­
ing of the first Lord Drummond—“ He
had,” says this author, “ four daughters,
one of whom, named Margaret, was so
much beloved by James the Fourth,
that he wished to marry her ; but as
they were connected by blood, and a
dispensation from the Pope was re­
quired, the impatient monarch con­
cluded a private marriage, from which
clandestine union sprang a daughter,
who became the wife of the Earl of
Huntly. The dispensation having ar-
rived, the king determined to celebrate
his nuptials publicly; but the jealousy
of some of the nobles against the house
of Drummond suggested to them the
cruel project of taking off Margaret by
poison, in order that her family might
not enjoy the glory of giving two queens
to Scotland,” (Moreri sub voce l)rum­
mond.) It is certain that Margaret
Drummond, with Euphemia Lady
Fleming, and the Lady Sybilla, her
sisters, clied suddenly at the same time,
with symptoms exciting a strong sus­
picion of poison, which it was thought
had been administered to them at
breakfast. So far the story substan-

NOTES AND ILLUSTRATIONS. 395

tially agrees with Moreri; but that the
unfortunate lady fell a victim to the
jealousy of the Scottish nobles, rests on
no authentic evidence; nor does this
explain why her two sisters, Lady
Flemiflg and Lady Sybilla, should have
shared her fate. The story tells more
like some dreadful domestic tragedy,
than a conspiracy of the aristocracy to
prevent the king’s marriage to a com­
moner. Besides this, it is shewn by a
deed preserved in the Fœdera, vol. xii.
p. 787, that James, previous to the
catastrophe of Margaret Drummond,
had entered into an indenture, binding
himself to marry the Princess Margaret
of England,—a circumstance certainly
not wholly disproving the story of her
having fallen a victim to aristocratic
jealousy, but rendering it more impro­
bable. If the dispensation for James’s
marriage with Margaret Drummond had
been procured, it is probable that it
would have been discovered by Andrew
Stewart during those investigations into
the Papal records which he instituted at
Rome on the subject of the great Doug­
las case, when he accidentally fell upon
the documents which settled the long­
agitated question regarding the mar­
riage of Robert the Second to Elizabeth
More. The three ladies thus united in
death were interred together in the
centre of the choir of the cathedral
chnrch at Dunblane. Their grave was
marked by three plain blue marble flags,
which remained untouched till 1817,
when they were removed to make way
for some repairs on the parochial church
into which the choir of the ancient
cathedral had been transformed. Sir
Walter Drummond, lord clerk-register,
their paternal uncle, was, at the time
of their death, Dean of Dunblane,—a
circumstance, says Mr Stirling, which
seems to have led to their interment
there, the family having lately removed
from Stobhall, their original seat on the
banks of the Tay, to Drummond Castle,
where they probably had no place of
interment. An entry in the Treasurer’s
Books, June 18, 1503, shews that the
king’s daughter by Margaret Drum­
mond had some time before been re­
moved from Drummond Castle to the
palace at Stirling :—“ Item to the nuriss
that brocht the king’s dochter fra Drum­
myne to Strivilin, 3 lbs. 10 sh.” The
child was brought up in Edinburgh
castle under the name of the Lady
Margaret; she married John, lord
Gordon, son and heir-apparent of Alex­

ander, earl of Huntly, (Mag. Sig. xv.
193.) 26th April 1510. In the Trea­
surer’s Books, under the 1st February
1502-3, is this entry:—“ltem te the
priests of Edinburgh for to do dirge and
saule messe for Mergratt Drummond,
v lb.” Again, February 10, 1502-3.
“ Item to the priests that sing in Dum­
blane for Margaret Drummond their
quarters fee v lbs.” Entries similar to
this are to be found in the Treasurer’s
Books, as far as they are extant, down to
the end of the reign, from which it ap­
pears that two priests were regularly
employed to sing masses for her soul in
Dunblane.

Lettee T, page 251.
8ir Andrew Wood of Largo.
The connexion of this eminent per­
son with James the Third is illustrated
by a charter under the great seal x. 87,
dated 8th March 1482, which states
that this monarch had taken into con­
sideration “ Gratuita et fidelia servicia
sibi per familiarem servitorem suum
Andkeam Wod commorante in Leith,
tam per terram, quam per mare, in pace
et in guerra, gratuiter impensà, in Regno
Scotiæ et extra idem, et signanter con­
tra inimicos suos Angliæ, et dampnum
per ipsum Andream inde sustenta, suam
personam gravibus vitæ exponendo peri­
culis.” On this ground it proceeds to
state that James granted to him and
his heirs, hereditarily and in fee, the
lands and village of Largo, in the
sheriffdom of Fife. It is probable
that Wood was originally a merchant
trader of Leith, and that a genius for
naval enterprise was drawn out and
cherished by casual encounters with
pirates in defence of his property;
after which, his talents, as a brave ancl
successful commander, becoming known
to James the Third, this monarch gave
him employment, not only in war and
against his enemies of England, but in
diplomatic negotiations. It has been
stated in the text that the brilliant
successes of Wood during the reign of
James the Fourth were against Eng­
lish pirates. This fact seems established
by a charter under the great seal xii.
304, 18th May 1491, in which James
the Fourth grants to Andrew Wood a
licence to build a castle at Largo with
iron gates, on account of the great ser­
vices done and losses sustained by the
said Andrew, and for the services which
it was confidently hoped he would yet

393 HISTORY OF SCOTLAND.

render; and because the said Andrew
had, at great personal expense, built
certain houses and a fortalice, on the
lands of Largo, by the hands of Eng­
lishmen captured by him, with the
object of resisting and expelling pirates
who had often invaded the kingdom,
and attacked the lieges. The existence
of a truce between the two kingdoms
at the time when these actions of Wood
are described as having taken place,
neither throws any suspicion on the
truth of this assertion, nor proves that
Henry may not have privately encour­
aged the expedition of Stephen Bull
against Wood. A truce existed be­
tween the kingdoms, and proposals for
bringing about a final peace on the basis
of a marriage between James and an
English princess were actually under
consideration, when Henry had bribed
the Lord Bothwell and Sir Thomas Tod
to seize the Scottish king and deliver
him into his hands, (Rymer, vol. xii. p.
440.) Some of the items of this date,
1491, in the Treasurer’s Accounts, prove,
in a very convincing manner, that James,
in all probability in consequence of the
advice and instructions of Andrew
Wood, had begun to pay great atten­
tion to everything calculated to increase
the naval strength of the kingdom. He
built ships at his own expense, made
experiments in sailing, studied the
principle3 of navigation and gunnery,
and attached to his service, by ample
presents, such foreign captains and
mariners as visited his dominions for
the purposes of trade and commerce.

Letter U, page 264.
Mons Meg.
Popular as Mons Meg has been
amongst the Scottish antiquaries of the
nineteenth century, her celebrity, when
she was carried by James the Fourth,
July 10, 1489, to the siege of Dum­
barton, if we may judge from some of
the items in the Treasurer’s Books, was
of no inferior description. Thus, under
that date we have this entry:—“ltem
given to the gunners to drink-silver
when they cartit Monss, by the King’s
command, 18 shillings.” Mons, how­
ever, from her enormous size and weight,
proved exceedingly unmanageable ; and
after having been brought back from
Dumbarton to Edinburgh, she enjoyed
an interval of eight years’ inglorious
repose. When James, however, in
1497, sat down before Norham, the

great gun was, with infinite labour and
expense, conveyed to the siege, and
some of the items regarding her trans­
port are amusing. The construction
of a new cradle or carriage for her seems
to have been a work of great labour.
Thus, on July 24,1497, we have, “ Item
to pynouris to bere ye trees to be Mons
new cradill to her at St Leonards quhare
scho lay, iii sh. vi^d ;" and again, July
28, “ Item for xiii stane of irne to mak
graith to Monsis new cradill, and gavil­
okkis to ga with her, xxx sh. iiii^d. "
“ Item to vii wrights for twa dayis and
a half ya maid Monsis cradill, xxiii sh.
iiii^d ." “ltem for xxiiii li of talloun
[tallow] to Mons.” “ Item for viii elne
of canwas to be Mons claiths to cover
her." " Item for mare talloun to Mons. "
“ Item to Sir Thomas Galbraith for
paynting of Monsis claiths, xiiii sh.”
“ Item to the Minstralis that playit
before Mons doune the gait, xiiii sh.”
The name of this celebrated gun, as
stated in the Treasurer’s Accounts, is
simply Mons. Drnmmond of Haw­
thornden is the first author who calls her
Mons Meg. For these curious particu-
lars I am indebted to the manuscript
notes of the Rev. Mr Macgregor Stir­
ling.

Letter V, page 264.
Perkin Warbeck.
It is difficult to solve the problem
whether James was a sincere believerin
the reality of Warbeck’s pretensions.
I am inclined to think that, from poli­
tical motives, he first entered into the
intrigues with the Duchess of Burgundy,
which commenced soon after Lambert
Simnel’s defeat and capture—though
without any steady conviction of the
truth of Warbeck’s story—but that he
became afterwards, on the arrival of this
extraordinary person in Scotland, a con­
vert to his being a son of the Duke of
York; and that he entertained the same
opinion even when he found it necessary
to advise his departure from Scotland.
Of the residence of Warbeck in this
country, the Treasurer’s Accounts fur­
nish some curious illustrations. It ap­
pears that Jamie Doig, a person whose
name occurs frequently in the Trea­
surer’s Books, and who is embalmed in
Dunbar’s Poems, “ tursed the arrass
work,” or arranged the hanging and
tapestry at Stirling, on the 20th Novem­
ber 1495, in contemplation of Prince
Richard’s arrival, (Treasurer’s Books

NOTES AND ILLUSTRATIONS. 397

under that date.) A person named
David Caldwell received eighteen shil­
lings for the “ graithing“ or furnishing
of his chamber in the town; and couriers
were sent with letters to the Lords of
Strathern and Athole, and to the Earl
Marshal and the Barons of Angus, re­
quiring them to attend upon the meet­
ing of the King and Prince Richard in
Saint Johnston, (Treasurer’s Book, sub
anno 1495.) It is mentioned in the text
that a tournament was held in honour
of his arrival, and many entries in the
Treasurer’s Books relate to it and to
the preparations at the same time for
the war against England. Thus, on the
9th September 1496. “ltem, for an
elne, half a quarter, and a nail of double
red taffety to the Duke of Zorkis banare
—for the elne, xviii sh.—xxi sh. iiii d.
Item, given for ii^c of gold party for the
Duke of Zorkis banere, xxvii sh. vii d.
1tem, for iii quaris of a silver buke to
the same banare, vi sh. Item, for half
a book of gold party to ye Duke of
Zorkis standart, xx sh. Item, for a
book of fine gold for the king’s coat
armour, iii lb. x sh. Item, to the Duke
of York in his purse by the king’s com­
mand, xxxvi lb.” In the following en­
try we find mention of an “ indenture,”
drawn up between James and the Duke
of York, which is now unfortunately
lost. " Item, given to Roland Robison
(he was a French gunner or engineer,
who had probably been in Warbeck’s
service when at the court of Charles the
Eighth) “for the red“ (settlement) “of
the Inglismen to the sea, hke as is con­
tenit in an indenture made betwixt the
king’s gude grace and the Duke of Zork,
ii^c lb.”

It is probable that one of the condi­
tions entered into by James in this in­
denture was to pay to Warbeck a month­
ly pension of one hundred and twelve
pounds. Thus, in the Treasurer’s Books,
May 6, 1497, we find this entry. “ltem,
to Roland Robison, for his Maisteris“
(“Zork “ on the margin) “monethis pen­
sioun, i^c xii lb.” Again, June 7, 1497.
“ Item, to Roland Robison and the
Dean of Zork, for their Maisteris mone­
this pension, i^c xii lb.” And again,
June 27. ’ ’ Giffin to the Dean of Zork
and Roland Robison for the Dukis (of
Zorkis) monethlie pensioun to come in,
i^c xii lb.” This large allowance, which
amounted to one thousand three hun­
dred and forty-four pounds yearly, was
probably one great cause for James’s
anxiety to see Warbeck out of the king­

dom ; for, besides the pension to the
Duke of York, it must be recollected
that the king supported the whole body
of his English attendants; and the en­
tries of payments to Roland Robison for
“ redding," or settling, the Englishmen’s
costs, are numerous. Warbeck, too,
appears to have been extravagant; for
notwithstanding his allowance, he had
got into debt, and had pledged his brown
horse, which he was forced to leave in
the innkeeper’s hands, although thir­
teen shillings would have set him free.
“ltem, giffin to the prothonotare to
quit out the Duke of Zorkis brown
horse that lay in wed in the toune, xiii
sh. “ The same Books contain a minute
detail of the victualling of the ship in
which Warbeck, accompanied by his
wife, Lady Catherine Gordon, quitted
Scotland. The vessel was not only
under the command, but was the pro­
perty of the afterwards celebrated Ro­
bert Bertoune. Amongst the stores were
" twa tun and four pipes of wine, eight
bolls of ait mele“ (oatmeal,) “ eighteen
marts of beef, twenty-three muttons,
and a hoghead of herring.” Andrew
Bertoune, the brother of the captain, is
mentioned as having furnished biscuit,
cider, and beer for the voyage. The
Duchess of York, by the king’s com­
mand, received three elns and a half of
“rowane cannee,” to make her “ane
see goune,” with two elne and a half of
ryssilis black, to make her cloaks. It is
well known that, after the execution of
Warbeck in 1498, the extraordinary
beauty and misfortunes of this lady in­
duced Henry the Seventh, whose dis­
position, although cautious, does not
appear to have been either cold or un­
amiable, to treat her with kindness and
humanity. The populace applied to her
the epithet of the White Rose of Scot­
land. She was placed under the charge
of the queen—received a pension—and
afterwards married Sir Mathew Cradock
of North Wales, ancestor of the Earls of
Pembroke, (Stewart’s Genealogy, p.
65.) From an entry in the privy purse
expenses of Henry the Seventh, pub-
lished by Sir Harris Nicolas, (p. 115
part ii. of the Excerpta Historica,) she
seems to have been taken on 15th Octo­
ber 1497.

Sir Mathew Cradock and the White
Rose had an only daughter, Margaret,
who married Sir Richard Herbert of
Ewyas, natural son of William, first
Earl of Pembroke, (Dugdale’s Baron-
age, vol. ii. p. 255.) Theiv son William,

398 HISTORY OF SCOTLAND.

on the extinction of the legitimate male
line of the Earls of Pembroke, was cre­
ated Earl of Pembroke by Edward the
Sixth, (Dugdale’s Baronage, vol. ii. p.
258.)

Sir Mathew Cradock and the Lady
Catherine, his wife, are interred in the
old church at Swansea, in Glamorgan-
shire, under a monument of the altar
kincl, richly decorated, but now much
mutilated and defaced—beneath which
is this inscription :—

here lteth sir mathu cradock,
knight, some time deputie unto the
right honourable charles grie of
worcet . . . in the county of gla­
morgan . . . mor . . chancellor of
the same, steward of gower and
kilvei, and my lady catherine his
wif.¹

“ Sir Edward Herbert of Ewyas is
buried,” says Dugdale, (Baronage, vol.
ii. p. 258,) “under a noble tomb at Bar­
gavenny, beside Margaret his wife.”

Letter X, page 294.

Battle of Flodden.
It is difficult, from the conflicting
account3 of historians, to arrive at the
numbers of each army in the battle of
Flodden ; and even more difficult to es­
timate the loss on both sides. That
nearly a hundred thousand souls mus­
tered on the Borough-muir is extremely
probable; but it is to be recollected,
that of these a great many were wag­
goners, sutlers, servants, and camp-fol-
lowers ; that the presence ot the king
and the whole body of the nobles in­
ferred the attendance of more than the
usual number of servants ; and that,
owing to the delay in active operations,
and the scarcity of provisions, the army
was diminished by desertion previous to
the battle. When this is considered,
the estimate of thirty-five or forty thou­
sand men (the latter number is that of
Dr Lingard) is probably pretty near
the truth. On the side of the Ënglish,
it is certain from the English contem­
porary account of the battle, that Sur­
rey's army was, at the lowest computa-
tion, twenty-six thousand strong; and
it is by no means improbable that this
was rather a low estimate. The battle

¹ Ree’s Beauties of England and Wales,
vol. xviii. p. 725.

² The rare contemporary tract reprinted by
my friend, Mr Pitcairn, and entitled, “Batayle
of Floddon-felde, called Brainston Moore,”
thus commences:— “ The maner of th’ ad­

began between four and five in the af ter­
noon of the 5th of September, and con­
tinued, according to an² authentic con­
temporary chronicle, “within night,”
that is some time after nightfall; all
accounts agreeing that the combatants
were only separated by darkness. It is
a mistake in Lingard, therefore, to tell
us it was decided in something more
than an hour. From half-past four on
the 5th of September, till after night­
fall, will give a continuance to the com­
bat of at least three hours. As to the
loss sustained, the common estimate of
ten thousand Scots is probably under
the truth. After giving the names of
the nobles and chiefs who were slain,
the ancient chronicle already quoted
observes, that over and above the said
persons, eleven or twelve thousand of
the Scots who were slain were viewed
by my Lord Dacre,⁴ and on tho inscrip-
tion on Surrey’s monument at Thetford,
the number is seventeen thousand.⁵ But
whilst this last, which may be consider-
ed a eulogistic estimate, is yet perhaps
not very far from the truth, it is evident
that there is an endeavour on the part
of the English historians to conceal their
own loss, when they state it at fiiteen
hundred men. Holinshed, who gives
this, admits that the “victory was
clearly bought on the side of the Eng­
lish,” and when it is considered that it
was a fair stand up fight, which lasted
with the utmost obstinacy for three
hours—that no pursuit took place till
next day—and that no quarter was given
on either side, the assertion that only
fifteen hundred English were slain, can­
not be believed. In noticing the very
few Scottish prisoners taken, the ancient
English account of the battle observes,
“many other Scottish prisoners coulcl
and might have been taken, but they
were so vengeable and cruel in their
fighting, that when Englishmen had the
better of them, they would not save
them, though it were that diverse
Scottes offered great sumes of money
for their lives. “ ⁶ Lord Thomas How­
ard, indeed, in his message to the king,
had declared, that as he expected no

vauncyng of my lord of Surrey, tresourier and
marshall of Englande, and levetenente gene­
rall of the north parties of the same, with
xxvi M. towards the kynge of Scotts and his
armye, vewed and nombred to an hundrede
thousande men at the leest.”

³ Ibid. p. 12.

⁴ Batayle of Brainston Moore, p. 11.

⁵ Ridpath’s Border History, p. 491.
⁶ Batayle of Brainston Moore, p. 12.

NOTES AND ILLUSTBATIONS. 399

quarter himself he woulcl give none ;
and this fierce resolution of the English
admiral was probably rendered more
intense in its operation by the silence of
the Scottish king, who replied with
courtesy to the cartel of Surrey, but
did not condescend to send Howard an
answer. With the exception of the
Highlanders and Islemen, the Scots pre­
served good discipline. Their army,
when first seen by Howard, was drawn
up in five divisions : some in the form
of squares, others in that of wedges,
and they descended the hill on foot in
good order, after the manner of the
Germans, in perfect silence.¹ Every
man, for the most part, was armed with
a keen and sharp spear, five yards in
iength, and a target which he held
before him. When their spears failed,
they fought with great sharp swords,
making little or no noise. The old ac­
count of the battle expressly states that
few were slain by arrows, as the rain
had damaged the English bows, but that
most fell by the bills of the English-
men; and yet the armorial device given
as an augmentation to his arms to Sur­
rey, in commemoration of his victory—
a demi-lion gules, transfixed with an
arrow—seems to contradict this; whilst
the impatience of the Highlanders,
under Huntly and Lennox, has always
been ascribed to the deadly discharge of
the English bowmen. The English ar­
tillery were well served, and did con­
siderable execution; whilst the Scottish
guns, injudiciously placed, and ill­
directed, fired over the heads of the
enemy—a blunder probably to be as­
cribecl to the obstinacy of the king, who
would not suffer them to play upon the
English columns when they were pass­
ing the river. James thus lost the
great advantage which might have been
derived from the acknowledged excel­
lence in the make and calibre of the
Scottish ordnance.

As the battle of Flodden is of much
importance in tracing the military his­
tory of the country, I may notice an
inaccuracy of Hume, which to the gene­
ral student might seem of little impor­
tance, but to the military reader it will
not appear so. This historian informs
¹ Original Gazette of the Battle of Flodden,
MS. in herald’s office, printed by Pinkerton.
—Appendix to 2d vol. No. X.—La battaile
dud : Roy D’Escosse estoit divisee en cinq :
battailles, Et chacun battaille loing l’un de
l’autre environ un trait d’arc * * partie
d’Eulx Estorent en quadrans, et autres en
maniere de pointe.

us² that Surrey, finding that the river
Till prevented his attack, made a feint
by marching to Berwick, as if he meant
to enter Scotland; upon which James
descended from his encampment, having
fired his huts. “ On this Surrey,” says
he, “took advantage of the smoke, and
passed the river with his army, render­
ing a battle inevitable, for which both
sicles prepared with tranquillity and
order.” This, any one who will stucly
the battle as it is given in this history,
from contemporary records, will dis­
cover to be a misapprehension of the
fact.

Letter Y, page 303.

Diurnal of Occurrents in Scotland.²—
Authenticity of the First Part of this
Work.

The frequent references in the text
to the first part of this work, as an ori­
ginal and valuable authority, renders it
necessary to explain the reasons which
have led the author to form a different
opinion of its authenticity from that
given by its learned editor. In the
Prefatory Notice to the volume, there
is this sentence, “to those who are at
all acquainted with the minute details
of Scottish history in the sixteenth cen­
tury, a very slight perusal of the work
will suggest that in its different parts
it is of very unequal value. From the
era of the battle of Flodden and the
death of King James the Fourth, in the
year 1513, at which it commences, down
to the termination of the government of
the Earl of Arran in 1553, its details,
comparatively meagre and occasionally
inaccurate, are obviously not recorded
by a contemporary chronicler, but must
have been derived from tradition and
other inrperfect sources. Yet, even in
this first and least valuable portion of
the work, will be found many minute
facts and notices that would be vainly
looked for in the ordinary histories of
the reign of King James the Fifth, and
the first ten years of the reign of Queen
Mary.”³ In pronouncing this first por­
tion of the Diurnal of Occurrents the
work, not of a contemporary chronicler,
but of some subsequent writer, deriving
his materials from tradition, and other
imperfect sources, the editor appears to
me to have fallen into an error, which
could scarcely have been avoided by one

¹ Hume’s History, p. 292.

² Published by the Bannatyne Club.
³ Preface, p. 1.

400 HISTORY OF SCOTLAND.

who compared the Diurnal of Occur­
rents with our earlier historians, Lesley
and Buchanan, or even with the later
volumes of Maitland. It not only is
contradicted by them in some important
particulars, but it contains events, and
these not minute, but grave and mate­
rial facts, which are not to be found in
either of these authors. These events,
however, can be provecl to have occurred
by evidence of which the authenticity
is unimpeachable; and it is the disco­
very of their perfect truth which has in­
duced me to consider the greater por­
tion of the first part of the Chronicle,
entitled the “ Diurnal of Occurrents in
Scotland,” as the work of a contempo-
rary, who wrote from his own know­
ledge, and not a compilation from tra­
ditionary sources. I say the greater
portion, because such a character be­
longs not to the whole of the first part;
and it seems probable that this valuable
original matter has fallen into the hands
of some later and ignorant compiler,
who, preserving the purer ore, has in
some places mixed it up with erroneous
additions of his own.

To support these conclusions, let me
give some proofs ; the years 1543, 1544,
occurring in the Regency of Arran, form
an obscure era in our history; and did
we possess no other guides than the
common historians, Lesley, Buchanan,
or Maitland, we should be left in a maze
of confusion and contradiction. The
revolutions in state affairs are so sudden
and so frequent during this period; the
changes in the politics and the conduct
of the different factions so rapid and so
apparently contradictory, that without
some more authentic assistants, the task
of unravelling or explaining them would
be hopeless. It is upon this period that
the original correspondence in the State­
Paper Office throws a flood of clear and
useful light, introducing us to the ac­
tors in these changes, not through any
second-hand or suspected sources, but
by supplying us with their original let­
ters to Henry the Eighth and his min­
isters. Now, to come from this obser­
vation to the work entitled the Diurnal
of Occurrents. When it is found that
it, and it only, contains various facts,
demonstrated by these original letters
to be true, and which sometimes are
not mentioned, sometimes are positively
contradicted by our general historians,
such a circumstance must create a strong
presumption in favour of its value and
authenticity; that a work which stands

this severe test should have been, not
a contemporary, but a later production,
compiled from tradition, and imperfect
sources, seems to me nearly impossible.

To take an example from the period
already mentioned. In the year 1544,
in the Diurnal of Occurrents, p. 33, we
fincl this passage:—“Upon the thrid day
of Junii, thare was ane general counsall
haldin at Stirling, quhairat was all the
nobelles of Scotland, exceptand the Erles
of Lennox and Glencairn ; quhair the
governor was dischargit of his auctorite;
and maid proclamation through the
realm, that na,ne obeyit him as gover­
nor; and als thair thei chesit thrie erlis,
thrie lords, thrie bishops, thrie abbotes
to be the secreit counsale; quhilk lastet
not lang, for everie lord ded for his
awin particular profit, and tuk na heid
of the commonweill; but tholet the
Inglismen and theivis to overrin this
realm.” In the same chronicle, p. 34,
is this sentence,—“ Upon the last day
of Julii, thare was ane Parliament sould
have been halden in Edinburgh; and the
governor, with his complices furneist
the town, and held it, becaus he gat
word the queenis grace drowarie was
cummit out of Striveling to the Parlia­
ment; becaus thai yet being in hir com­
pany was full of dissait, sho past to Stir­
ling with meikle ordinance and swa the
Parliament was stayit.” Again, in the
same chronicle, p. 36, we find this pas­
sage,—“ Upon the 5th day, (1544,) the
governor held ane parliament in Edin­
burgh.—Upon the 12th of November,
the queen’s grace drowrier [dowager]
held ane parliament in Striveling, and
thareafter the parties suld have met,
and stayet in hope of aggreance, and the
cardinal raid betwix them, quha come
to Edinburgh and tuk the governor to
Stirling with him, quhair gude aggre­
ance was made to be bund to hir grace,
and twentee four Lordis counsall.” It
will be at once perceived that these
passages embody the history of an im­
portant revolution, which for nearly six
months changed the whole face of af­
fairs in Scotland. In May 1544, Arran
was the unchallenged governor of the
kingclom ; in June, the queen-dowager
arose against him, was joined by the
whole body of the peers excepting Len­
nox and Glencairn, held a general coun­
cil at Stirling, in which he was dis­
charged from his office, made procla­
mation through the realm that none
should obey him, and appointed a new
secret council for the management of

NOTES AND ILLUSTKATiONS. 401

the affairs of the state. In July, as is
shewn by the second extract, an attempt
was made by Arran, who still claimed
the name and authority of governor, to
hold a parliament in Edinburgh; but
the-queen-dowager advanced with great
force to the city; the governor fortified
it against her; she retreated to Stirling,
and the parliament was delayed. Three
months after this, in the beginning of
November, Arran the governor assem­
bled a parliament at Edinburgh; the
queen issued writs for a rival parlia­
ment, to be held on the 12th of the
same month at Stirling; and the car­
dinal dreading the effects of this miser­
able disunion, acted as a peace-maker
between the two parties, and at length
brought them to an agreement.

Now, of these very important events,
no notice whatever was to be found in
our general historians ; nay, the tenor
of their narratives seemed to contradict
them; the question, therefore, at once
came to the credibility of the Diurnal
of Occurrents. In this dilemma I was
delighted (the reader, who knows the
satisfaction of resting, in researches of
this nature, upon an authentic docu­
ment, will pardon the warmth of the
expression) to meet with the following
paper in the State-paper Office, which,
it will be seen, completely corroborated
the assertion of the Diurnal as to the
deprivation of the governor. It is
dated June 1544, and entitled, “Copy.
—Agreement of the principal Scots
nobility to support the authority of
the queen-mother as regent of Scotland
against the Earl of Arran, declared by
this instrument to be deprived of his
office.” This valuable paper in its en­
tire state will be given in the forth­
coming volume of State-papers relative
to Scotland, published by Government.
In the meantime, the following extract
will be sufficient for my purpose. After
stating the fact of a convention having
been held at Stirling on the 3d of June,
it proceeds thus to describe their delibe­
rations and proceedings. “After long
and mature consultacion had, in the
said matiers, by the space of iii. or iv.
daies contynuall, fynally [they] fand
that oon great part why inobedience
hath ben within this realme, sithins
the king’s grace’s, and that other incon­
veniences which have happened, was,
and is in my lord governor, and his
counsaile, that was chosen to have ben
with him for the time : and for remedye
herof in times commyng, and that per­
VOL. II.

fit obedience maie be to our soverain
ladie’s aucthorite, [that] unite, concorde,
and amitee maie be hadd among all our
soverain ladie’s lieges, and speciallie
among the great men ; and that they
maie convent at all times to give their
counsaile in all matiers concernyng the
quene’s grace our soverain ladye, and her
realme; ancl that justice maie be doon
and executed among the lieges therof;
and that resistance maie be made to our
ennymies : They all, without variaunce,
consulted and deliberated, that the
quene’s grace, our soverain ladye’s mo­
ther, shulde be egall with him therin­
till; and that oon great counsaile, ad­
joyned with my lord governor in the
using of th’ aucthoritie of governement
in all times comyng, shulde be chosen,
of xvi. persones — xii. of them the
greatest erles ancl temporal lords of the
realme, and iv. spiritual men, as in the
deliveraunce mad therupon the vi.th
daie of the saicle monith of Junii, is at
more length conteyned. The whiche
deliveraunce and counsaile was shewen
and declared to my lorde Governor, be­
fore the quene’s grace and the whole
lords, the saide vi.th daie of Junii.
And the lords who devised the same,
praied my lord governor that he wold
consent therto, both for his owne weale
and for the weale of our soverain ladye
the quene, and of the whole realme, for
divers causes and respects particularly
appointed and declared; and specially,
because the quene’s grace our soverain
ladie’s mother is a noble ladye of highe
linage and bludde, of great wisedome,
ancl haile of lief, having the king of
Ffrance, and the greattest nobles of
that realme, and others about hyr,
tendre kynsmen and friends, who will
be the more readye to supporte the
realme for defense of the same if hyr
grace be well favoured and honored by
the nobles therof, and holden in honor
and dignitie; and also, because the
whole nobles have theire special confi­
dence in hyr grace, and doo think them
sure to convene in any place where hyr
grace is present. My lord Governor tuke
to be advised while the morne at even,
viz. the vii.th daie of the saide monith,
and then to give the answer. Attour,
that same daie incontinent the saide de­
liveraunce and consultacion was shewen
to the remanent of the lords, both pre­
lates, erles, lords, barons, and other
noble men of the realme personallie
present, who being all singularlie asked
of theire opinion, declarecl, ilk man for
2 c

402 HISTORY OF SCOTLAND.

himselfe, that the saide deliveraunce
and consultacion was good and for the
common weale of this realme : and
therfore affirmed the same. The which
vii.th daie being bepast, and noon an­
swer made nor sent by my lorde Gover­
nor on the premises, and aftre diverse
messages sent to him of the lords of
Counsaile, and nothing reaported again
but vayne delaies : The lords of Coun­
saile, upon the ix.th daie of the saide
moneth, directed furth our soverain
ladie's (letres) to require my saide lorde
Governor to compare in the said Graye
ffrers place of Striveling, where the said
convencion is holden, upon the x.th daie
of the said moneth, to accept and con­
sent to the saide ordinaunce and articles,
and to concurre with the quene’s grace
in th’ administration of the governement
with th’ advise and counsaile of the
lords; with certification, that if he
faileth it, the lords wolde determyn
him to be suspended from th’ adminis-
tracion of his offices, and wolde provide
howe the same shulde be used in time
to coom while further remeadie weare
founde therto, as in the saide letres di­
rected therupon more f ully is conteyned.
A.t the which x.th daie of Junii the lords
convented in the fratre of the said graie
(Freers, and there consulted upon the
matiers concerning the commonweale-
fande, and awayted upon the coming of
my lord governor, and upon his answer,
i*or a x houres before noon while xii
howers was stryken. And he neither
conrpared by himself, nor sent his an­
swer to accept and consent to the said
ordinaunces and statutes there. Than
the lords gave theire decrete, decerning
my lord Governor to be suspended, and
suspending him from th' administration
of his offices, while further remeadye
weare funde therfor. And because of
the urgent necessite of the realme, and
invading of the same by our old enny­
mies of England, and for the furthe
setting of our soverain ladie’s aucthorite,
and perfit obedience to be had therto,
unitie concord to be had among all them
of this realme both great and smale
without th’ administration of the go­
vernement weare put in soom persones
hands most convenient therfor, the saide
lords, without variaunce, have thought
noo other persone more convenient ther­
to nor the quene’s grace our soverain
ladie’s mother, for the good and urgent
causes before expressed. And therefore
have chosen hyr grace to use and min­

ister in the saide office of governement,
with th’ advise of the lords of counsaile
conforme to the acts and ordinaunces
made therupon of before, while further
remedye be made herto. And hyr grace
hath accept the same in and upon hyr
to be used with th’ advise of the saide
lords as said is. And bicause hir grace
can not doo the same without she be
starklie mainteyned and defended ther­
intyll, Therefore we archbishopps, bish­
opps, erles, lords, barons, abbotts, and
others noble men whose names herafter
subscribed, doo bynd and oblige us, and
promitt by the faithes in our bodies, and
have gyven our aithes herupon, that we
shall maintein and defende the quene’s
grace our soverain ladie’s mother in the
using and administracion of th’ office of
governement and th’ aucthorite in all
things. And we shall gyve unto hyr
our best counsaile in all things. And
shall resist with our bodies and friends
and our hole substance, to all them that
will impugne or comen in the contrarie
therof undre the payne of perjurie and
infamye. And also ilk oon of us shall
tak afalde part with others, without
excus or fenzeing in this matier and
defense therof. Undre the paine afor­
saide.

" Gawen of Glasgow.

Patrick Morvinen.

Willm of Dumblane.

E,o. Orchaden : Epis.

T. Commendator of Driburt, D.
de Cuper, V. de Culros.

Archbald Erle of Anguss.

Erle Bothwile.

Willm Erle of Montross.

Willm Lord Sanchar.

Robart Maxwell.

George Erle of Huntlie.

G. Erle of Caslis.

Erle of Merschell.

John Erle of Mentieth.

Hew lord Somerwell.

George Duglass.

Erle of Murray.

Archd Erle of Argile.

George Erle of Erroll.

John lord Erskin.

Willm lord of Sanct Jonn.

Malcum lorde chalmerlane.

Hew lord Lovett.

Schir John Campbell of Cawder.
Kgt.¹”

This extract settles the point as to the
¹ In the State-paper Office; now published
for the first time.

NOTES AND ILLUSTRATIONS. 403

correctness of the Diurnal in its narra­
tive of the revolution of the 3d of June.
Next came the question regarding the
rival parliaments, the meeting of the
three estates at Edinburgh, by sum­
mons of the governor, on the 5th of
November, and the meeting of the par­
liament at Stirling, by summons of the
queen-regent, on the 12th of the same
month : upon this point the correspond-
ence in the State-paper Office was silent;
but fortunately the evidence of the
Acts of the Scottish parliament estab­
lishes the accuracy of the facts stated in
the Diurnal of Occurrents. In the
second volume of the Acts,p. 445, we
find that the governor Arran held a
parliament at Edinburgh on the 6th of
November; and one of the acts then
passed by the three estates is thus en­
titled :—“ Deliverance annulling ane
Proclamation be the Queen’s Moder,
and certain Lordis, of ane pretendit
parliament, and of certane other pre­
tendit actis.” In turning to the act we
find the whole narrative of the Diurnal
thus fully corroborated. It states, that
“the queen mother (I use the modern
spelling) to our sovereign lady, with a
part of lords and others our sovereign
lady’s lieges, ill-advised, has caused
proclaim a pretended parliament to be
held at the burgh of Stirling, the 12th
day of November, instant, with continu-
ation of days, without any sufficient
authority; " after this preamble, the
decision of the three estates is thus
given :—“the whole three estates of
parliament, with the votes of many
others, nobles, barons, and gentlemen,
being present, has declared, and declares
the said pretended parliament to be
held at Stirling, as said is, and the pre­
tended summons raised against my lord
Governor, in their manner, to have been
and to be, from the beginning, of none
avail, force, nor effect. And such like
all pretended acts made at Stirling re­
garding the suspending of my lord
Governor from the administration of
his said office, and discharging him of
his authority in their manner.” The
evidence contained in this statute so
clearly proves the accuracy of the Diur­
nal of Occurrents, that upon this point
any other remark would be superfluous.

A second proof of the authenticity of
the same work is to be found in the
accuracy of the account there given of
the intrigues of the Douglases and their
treasonable correspondence with Eng­

land, at a time when our general his­
torians know nothing of any such
matters. Here the Diurnal of Occur­
rents maintains its character for truth,
when examined by the severest of all
tests, the original correspondence of the
principal actors in the events. Of this
I shall give a striking example. In the
Diurnal, pp. 39, 40, is an account of
that abortive invasion of the governor,
(August 10, 1545,) in which he broke
into England with an army of thirty
thousand men, and again on the third
day thereafter, the 13th of August, was
compelled to return home. Now, on
this occasion, the Diurnal ascribes the
failure of the expedition, and the re­
treat and dispersion of the army, to the
deceit and treachery of George Douglas
and his party.¹ The dispersion of the
Scottish army is thus mentioned, p.
39 :—“ Upon the nynt [ninth] day of
August, the governor with his company
made their musters on Fawnrig Mure to
the number of 30,000 men by [besides]
the Frenchmen whilk [which] were 3000.
And the same day at even they passed
in England, and burnt Cornwall and
Tilmouth, Edderslie, Brankston, with
sendrie othere towns thereabouts, and
there did no other thing to their lak and
dishonour.” “Upon the tenth day of
August, the said Scottis was pairted
[divided] in three battles [battalia], in
the vanguard the Earl of Angus, Mar­
shall, Errol, Glencairn, and Cassillis,
Lords Gray, Glammes, and Yester; in
the rereward Erles Huntly, Bothwell,
Lords Ruthven, Drummond, Borth­
wick, Fleming, Home ; in the middle
ward the Governor, with the body of
the realme and Frenchmen, with twa
wings, the ane [one] Lord Seton, the
Laird of Bass, and many other gentle­
men, the other the Laird of Buccleugh,

¹ The retreat from Coldingham is ascribed
to the same cause, “ On the morne [morrow]
the Scots without any skaith [harm] fled
misorderlie. The Inglishmen persevand this.
twa thousand of thame followit the chase to
Cockburne quha durst not bide [stay] a
strike. Of this hoste the Erle Angus had the
wangaird [vanguard], there was with him
the Erles of Cassillis, Glencairne, the Lords
Somerville, Yester, the sheriff of Ayr, quha
[who] did but feebly ; in the rear was the
Earl of Bothwell, quha baid [abided] stiffly
quhill [until] he might no more. George
Douglas had tbe wyte [blame] hereof, for he
said the Englishmen were ten thousand men,
lyin within the said town : the invention
|artifice] was saissit on chance by the Erle of
Bothwell.”

404 HISTORY OF SCOTLAND.

with all Liddesdale and Teviotdale;
and on this order theyraid [rode] in Eng­
land, and burnt Tweesdale, Grendonrig,
the great tower, Newbigging, and Dudie,
with the towers thereof ; and there was
on the Pethrig of Englishmen 6000
[had] the Scots followed with speed,
they had vanquished all the said Eng­
lishmen. TTpon the 13th day of Au-
gust, the Scottish men come hame,
through the deceit of George Douglas,
and the vanguard, who would not pass
again through his tyisting.”

Such is the history of this remark­
able invasion given in the Diurnal, and
to this narrative the same observation
may be applied which was already made
regarding the revolution in 1544, namely,
that such an explanation of the cause of
its failure is new to Scottish history,
and to be found in the Diurnal alone.
We find no mention of any such thing
in Lesley, Maitland, or Buchanan. How,
then, are we to discover the truth upon
this subject? Simply by going to the
letters of the actors themselves, which
describe these events, and are fortu­
nately accessible. In the State­paper
Office we find an original despatch from
the Earl of Hertford and the Council
of the north to Henry the Eighth, in
which, after detailing the plan of his
proposed invasion, he encloses a letter
in cipher which he had received from
George Douglas and the Earls of Angus,
Cassillis, and Marshal. It may be well
to give Hertford’s description of the
mode in which this letter was conveyed
to him, as it contains a curious illus­
tration of the extreme caution with
which this secret correspondence be­
tween Henry the Eighth and the Doug­
lases was carried on. “ After this
device of the said proclamation, one
Thomas Forster, who was of late, by
your majestie’s commandment, at the
desire of the Earls of Angus and Cas­
sillis, George Douglas and others, sent
to them into Scotland, came hither to
me the said earl, and shewed me a let­
ter sent to him from one Sym Penango,
servant to George Douglas, of such effect
as your majesty may perceive by the
same letter here enclosed; upon the
sight whereof I willed the said Thomas
Forster to go and speke with the said
Penango according to his desire, with
whom he hath been at the place ap­
poynted between them, where he re­
ceived of the said Penango a letter in
eipher, sent him from George Douglas,

which we have deciphered, and send
both the cipher and the decipher to
your majesty herewith.”¹ The letter
here described not only establishes the
fact of the general treasonable corre­
spondence between Henry and the Earls
of Angus, Cassillis, Marshal, George
Douglas, and others, which is men­
tioned in the “Diurnal,” but contains
this remarkable passage relative to the
expedition of Arran into England, on
the 9th of August­, and his return home
on the 13th of the same month, which,
in the same work, is ascribed to the de­
ceit of George Douglas and the van­
guard. “ Further, as to this last jour­
ney of ours, it was advised by the queen,
cardinal, and this French capitaine,
Lorges Montgomery. Huntly fortified
this army at his power. Notwithstand-
ing, at short, all that they devised was
stopped by us that are the king's friends.
Their whole intent was to have besieged
the king’s houses, unto the time they
had gotten bargain, but all was stopt,
whereof they stood nothing content.”²
Now, looking to the passage above in the
Diurnal, we find it there asserted that
the expedition was ruined “ thro the
deceit of George Douglas and the van­
guard.” We know, from the same
work, that in the vanguard were the
Earls of Angus, Cassillis, and Marshal,
with others. The journey or invasion
took place on the 10th of August, the
retreat on the 13th, and here on the
25th of the same month, we have a
letter from George Douglas and the
Earls of Angus, Cassillis and Marshal,
in which they declare to the Earl of
Hertford, that the whole expedition
was stopped by them, and claim credit
for it with the English king. This coin­
cidence offers a fine example of the cor­
roboration of an ancient chronicle by
the original correspondence of the times;
and the learned editor of the Diurnal
will readily allow thafc a work thus
corroborated could not have been com­
piled from traditional and imperfect
sources, but must have been the pro­
duction, not only of a contemporary
writer, but of one minutely and ac­
curately informed in the history of the
times. It is for this reason I have
quoted it as an original authority, and
have preferred any information it com­
municates to the vague, loose, and ima­

¹ Orig. State-Paper Office ; not before pub­
lished.

² Ibid.

NOTES AND ILLUSTRATIONS. 405

ginary details of the general historians
of this period. Other instances might
be given of the accuracy of the first part
of the Diurnal when checked by the
correspondence of the times, but my
limits will not permit me. That there
are occasional errors in the narrative is
not to be disputed : but they may be
chiefly traced, I think, to the ignorance
or carelessness of the transcribers of the
manuscript.

Letter Z, pages 361 and 362.
Conspiracy of Lady Glammis.

That a noble matron, in the prime of
life, and of great beauty, should be
tried, condemned, and burnt, for an
attempt to compass the king’s death by
poison, and should also have the crime
of witchcraft imputed to her by most of
our historians, is an appalling event.
In the absence of direct proof, Mr Pit­
cairn, in his notes upon the trial of
Lady Glammis, has adopted the story
told by Buchanan, (book xiv. c. 54,) and
repeated by all following writers, with
the exception of Pinkerton ; he pro­
nounces her innocent of the crimes laid
to her charge, and a victim of James’s
implacable hatred to the house of Doug­
las. The examination of the curious
evidence which he has published has led
me to form a different opinion. As to her
being justly found guilty of treason, in
assisting the Earl of Angus and George
Douglas, in their attempts to “invade“
the king’s person, and re-establish their
authority in Scotland, there seems to be
no question. It was natural she should
support her brothers; and had her
offences been confined to this, although
the act was undoubtedly treason, it is
probable the sentence of death would
have been exchanged for banishment or
imprisonment. But a litfcle investiga-
tion will convince us, I think, that the
king was not so unjust and implacable
as has been imagined, nor the lady the
injured and innocent woman she has
been represented. Let us look a little
into her life.

She married, probably about the year
1521, John, sixth Lord Glammis. He
died on the 8th of August 1528, in his
thirty-seventh year; and, about four
months after his death, (Dec. 1, 1528,)
Lady Glammis was summoned, with
Patrick Hume of Blacater, Hugh Ken­
nedy of Girvanmains, and Patrick Char­
teris, to answer before parliament for

having given assistance to the Earl of
Augus in convocating the king’s lieges
for the invasion of his majesty’s per­
son.¹ These men were all bold and
active partisans of the Douglases. On
September 20, 1529, we find that Lady
Glammis and Patrick Charteris of Cu­
thelgurdy, a person who, in the inter­
val, had been indicted to stand his trial
for fire-raising and cow-lifting,² ob­
tainecl a letter of licence to pass to parts
beyond sea, on their pilgrimage, and
other lawful business.³ Whether Pat­
rick and the lady had gone upon their
pilgrimage, does not appear, but she
dicl not interrupt her political intrigues,
and seems to have been again not only
summoned, but found guilfcy of treason;
for, on July 1, 1531, we find that Gavin
Hamilton got a gift from the crown of
the escheat of all the goods heritable
and movable, of Janet Lady Glammis,
which had been forfeited on account of
her intercommuning with our sove­
reign lord’s rebels, or for any other
crimes.⁴

At this time she appears to have fled
from justice, and we lose sight of her
for some time ; but, on 31st January
1532, a far darker crime than caballing
with rebels, or associating with fire­
raisers, was laid to her charge. She
was summoned to stand her trial at the
justice-ayre of Forfar, for the poison­
ing her husband Lord Glammis. The
crimes of poisoning and witchcraft were
then very commonly associated, as may
be seen from many interesting trials in
Mr Pitcairn’s Collections. The great
dealers in poisons were witches, and
the potency of their drugs was thought
to be increased by the charms and in­
cantations with which they were con­
cocted : hence probably the mala fama
against Lady Glammis, as a witch or
sorceress. But however this may be,
it is certain that, on February 2, ancl
February 26, 1532, Lord Ruthven, Lord
Oliphant, with the Lairds of Ardoch,
Moncrieff, Tullibardine, and a great
many other barons, to the number of
twenty-eight, were fined for not appear­
ing to pass upon the Lady Glammis’
jury :⁵ and the imperfect and mutilated
state of the criminal records of this
period, unfortunately leaves us in the

¹ Pitcairn, vol. i. p. 188.

² Ibid. vol. i. p. 141.

³ Ibid. vol. i. p. 244.

⁴ Ibid. vol. i. p. 246.

⁵ Pitcairn’s Trials. vol, i. p. 153,

406 HISTORY OF SCOTLAND.

dark as to the future proceedings upon
this trial. The probability seems to be,
that she was either acquitted, or the
charge dropped from want of evidence.
If innocent, she was certainly most un­
fortunate ; for, on the 17th of July
1537, she was, for the fourth time,
brought to trial, found guilty of having
been art and part in the conspiring the
death of the king by poison, and also
for her having treasonably assisted Ar­
chibald, earl ofAngus, and George Doug­
las his brother, who were traitors and
rebels. For this crime she was con­
demned to be burned at the stake, the
common mode of death, as Mr Pitcairn
informs us, for all females of rank in
cases of treason and murder, and from
which he plausibly conjectures, that the
vulgar opinion of her having been burn­
ed for a witch may have partly arisen.
Her son Lord Glammis, then only six­
teen years old, her husband Archibald
Campbell, a priest, and a barber named
John Lyon, were tried along with her.
The witnesses, as was usual in this cruel
age, being examined under the rack, or
pynebaukis, Lord Glammis, on his own
confession, was found guilty of conceal-
ing the conspiracy, and imprisoned till
the death of James the Fifth, when he
was restored to his estates and honours,
upon the ground, that, in fear of his
life, and having the rack before his eyes,
he had made a false confession.¹ The
long extracts given by Mr Pitcairn, from
the histories of Scott, (not Sir Walter
Scott,) Lesley, Hume of Godscroft, and
the Genealogy of the house of Drum-
mond, seem to me scarcely worthy of
the place he has assigned them,² and
cannot be quoted as authentic evidence.
Scott’s story is a mere repetition of
Buchanan’s, with some ludicrous adcli­
tions of his own—as, where he tells us,
Archibald Campbell, the husband of
Lacly Glammis, commanded the third
regiment in the king’s army. Lesley
falls into blunders which Mr Pitcairn
has detected ; Sir James Balfour re­
peats them; and as for David Hume of
Godscroft, none accmainted with his his­
tory will trust him, when he stands un­
supported by other evidence. The only
authentic, and, as l believe, contemporary
account of the trials of the Master of For­
bes and Lady Glammis, is to be found in
the following passage from the Diurnal of
Occurrents,p. 22:—“ In this menetyme,

¹ Pitcairn’s Trials, vol. i. p 327.

² Ibid. vol. i. p. 244.

the Master of Forbes was accusit of
tressone by the Laird of Lenturk, and
was put in ward in the castell of Edin-
burgh. In the said moneth of Julii,
the Lacly Glammis, sister to Archibald,
earl of Angus, was accusit for tressonne;
her husband, Archibald Campbell of
Skepnische; her son, the Lord Glammis,
of sixteen yeares of age ; ane barbour
John Lyon, and ane priest, all accusit
in the tolbooth of Edinburgh. The
said lady was condamnit to be brynt
quhell deid : scho deet; ancl her hus­
band, sone, and the rest, ordanyt to
remain in prisone in the castell of Edin­
burgh forsaid.³ —Upon the 13th day
of July, the Master of Forbes was con­
victed for tressonne, and drawin, hangit,
and heidit. "

That there is any ground on which
we may conclude, that unprincipled
witnesses were brought forward to give
false testimony, upon which the jury
were compelled to convict her, I can­
not admit; still less do I perceive the
proceedings to have been characterised
by any savage traces of unmanly revenge
upon the part of the king. On the
other hand, it appears clear, that at
this time the Douglases, whose last
hope of restoration had been desfcroyed,
began to embrace desperate designs.
“ The letters of Penman, their secret
agent,” says Pinkerton (vol. ii. p. 350,)
“ to Sir George Douglas, his employer,
betray a malice, and designs the most
horrid.” “ The king is crazed, and ill
spoken of by his people.” “He has
beggared all Scotland. " “ All are weary
of him.” “James shall do the com­
mandment of the Douglases, God will­
ing." “ All hate him and say he must
go down.” “His glass will soon run
out.” These diabolical expressions
against a prince in the vigour of early
life, what can they insinuate but poison
or the dagger ? Could they be ad­
dressed to a person who did not seal
them with approbation? And could a
more fit or secret agent than a sister be

³ We may infer, I thinlc, from the omission
of any notice of the horrid fate of the husband
of Lady Grlammis, who, some time after his
imprisonment, was dashed to pieces on the
rocks in attempting to escape from the castle
of Edinburgh, that the Diurnal was written
at the very time of his trial. It is hardly
possible, if it had been a subsequent com­
pilation, that this circumstance, which ap­
pears in all our historians, would have been
omitted. That the author was a Roman
Catholic appears from a passage in p. l9.

NOTES AND ILLUSTRATIONS. 407

cmployed to promote the interests of
her family at any risk ?" If the reader
will turn to Pitcairn’s Criminal Trials,
p. 190, and read the names of the jury­
men who gave the verdict against her,
he will scarcely admit the idea of her
heing innocent; and it is worthy of
notice, that instead of having the least
appearance of its being a packed jury,
some of the leading men amongst them
were friends and near connexions of the
Douglases. John earl of Athole, one of
the jury, married Janet, a sister of that
Master of Forbes who suffered for treason
at the same time as Lady Glammis, and
who was a supporter of the Douglases.—
(Douglas Peerage, vol. i. p. 141.) Ro­
bert lord Maxwell, another of the jury,
it is wcll known, was intimately con-
nected with the Douglases. He mar­
ried a daughter of Douglas of Drum­
lanrig, (Douglas, vol. ii. p. 317,) and his
daughter, Margaret Maxwell, was after­
wards married to Archibald, earl of An­
gus, brother to Lady Glammis. Wil­
liam, Master of Glencairn, a third jury­
man, was also nearly related to the
Douglases, and constantly of their party.
His mother was Marjory, a daughter of
Archibald, fifth Earl of Angus, a sister
of Gawin Douglas, the celebrated trans­
lator of Virgil, and a grand­aunt of the
Earl of Angus, and of Lady Glammis.
Gilbert, earl of Cassillis, another of the
jurymen, and the pupil of Buchanan,
was also a firm partisan of the Doug­
lases. Are we to believe that these
men violated their oaths, and found
guilty, upon false evidence, an innocent
and noble lacly, in whose favour they
must have f elt a strong bias ?

Pinkerton, whilst he defends James
on good grounds, too rashly pronounces
the cases of the Master of Forbes and
of Lady Glammis to have had no con­
nexion with each other. There is, I
think, a strong presumption to the con­
trary. The similarity in the charges
against them, the circumstance that
hoth were apprehended, tried, and exe­
cuted within two days of each other—
the Master of Forbes on Saturday the
14th of July, and Lady Glammis on
Tuesday the 17th ; and the fact that
the object of both appears to have been
to procure the restoration of the Doug­
lases by compassing the death of the
king, are striking circumstances, and
look as if both plots had been coined in
the same mint. The revealer of the
conspiracy of Forbes was, as we learn

from the extract from the Diurnal of
Occurrents, the Laird of Lenturk; and
this gentleman, we find from Pitcairn,
vol. i. p. 200, was Thomas Strachan.
His son, John Strachan, was accused as
being a participator in the Master of
Forbes’s treason, and it is worthy of
notice, that David Strachan, probably
of the same family, was one of those
apprehended at the same time that Lord
Glammis the son, and Home of Wed­
derburn the brother-in-law of Lady
Glammis, were imprisoned.¹ David
Strachan, whose piteous petition for
liberation has been given by Pitcairn,
vol. i. p. 206, is nowhere mentioned as
having been concerned in the treason of
the Lord Forbes. The presumption
seems to be, that he was imprisoned for
his participation in Lady Glammis’s
plot, and this seems in some degree to
connect the two conspiracies. But all
this is conjectural.² It was not till the
22d of August, about five weeks after
Lady Glammis had suffered, that John
Lyon, her accomplice, was tried and
found guilty of imagining and conspir-
ing the king’s death by poison ; ancl of
using the same poison for the destruc-
tion of the Earl of Rothes ; whilst, on
the same day, Alexander Makke, who
had sold the poison, knowing from Lyon
for what purpose it was bought, was also
tried and convicted. Lyon was be­
headed : and Makke had his ears cut
off and was banished by a singular sen­
tence from all parts of Scotland,
except the county of Aberdeen.³ Mr
Pitcairn has drawn an inference for the
innocence of Lady Glammis, from the
fact that a number of lords and inferior
barons suffered themselves to be fined
rather than act as jurymen against her.
This, however, one of his most noted
cases, shews to be no proof. The Master
of Forbes confessed on the scaffold that
he was guilty of the murder of Seton of
Meldrum ; yet when tried on the 27th
of August 1530, Gordon of Achindown,
Lyon of Colmelegy, and fifteen other
barons and landed gentlemen, were fined

¹ Sir Thomas Clifford’s Letter, quoted by
Pitcairn, vol. i. p. 198.

² Pitcairn, vol. i. p. 202* 203*.

³ John Strachan and Donald Mackay were
accomplices with the Master of Forbes, in the
murder of Seton of Meldrum. Pitcairn’s
Criminal Trials, vol. i. p. 150-175: Alexan­
der Makke (Mackay) and David Strachan were
accomplices with Lady Grlammis in her at­
tempt to poison the king.

403 HISTORY OF SCOTLAND.

for not appearing to pass on his assize.
A refusal of this kind was in fact a
proof of the power, not of the innocence
of the party accused. In concluding
this note, I may mention that Lord
Glammis had made himself obnoxious
to the Douglases, and may therefore
have incurred the resentment of his
high-spirited and determined consort,

by refusing to join them with his vas­
sals on the noted occasion, when they
proceeded against the Border thieves,
taking the young king along with them
—(Pitcairn, vol. i. p. 136.) It was on
this occasion that Scott of Buccleuch
unsuccessfully attempted to rescue his
sovereign from the captivity in which
he was held.

end of vol. ii,

BALLANTYXE AND COMPANY, PRINTERS, EDINBURGH.

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