Walter Scott

“ The king, in following the chace upon the Pentland hills, had often started a "white faunch deer," which had always escaped from his hounds; and he asked the nobles, who were assembled around him, whether any of them had dogs which they thought might be more successful. No courtier would affirm that his hounds were fleeter than those of the king, until Sir William St Clair of Rosline unceremoniously said, he would wager his head that his two favourite dogs, "Help and Hold," would kill the deer before she could cross the March-burn. ”

“ As soon as the bloudy garter was brought me, I put it within the bason, observing, in the interim, what Mr Howel did, who stood talking with a gentleman in a corner of my chamber, not regarding at all what I was doing; but he started suddenly, as if he had found some strange alteration in himself. I asked him what he ailed? "I know not what ailes me; but I finde that I feel no more pain. Methinks that a pleasing kinde of freshnesse, as it were a wet cold napkin, did spread over my hand, which hath taken away the inflammation that tormented me before." ”

“ Stay not thou for food or sleep.
Be it scroll, or be it book,
Into, knight, thou must not look;
If thou readest thou art lorn!
Better hadst thou ne'er been born."
XXIV.
"O swiftly can speed my dapple-gray steed,
Which drinks of the Teviot clear;
Ere break of day," the warrior 'gan say,
"Again will I be here:
And safer by none may thy errand be done,
Than, noble dame, by me;
Letter nor line know I never a one,
Wer't my neck-verse at Hairibee [5] ." ”

“ David the first of Scotland purchased the reputation of sanctity, by founding, and liberally endowing, not only the monastery of Melrose, but those of Kelso, Jedburgh, and many others, which led to the well-known observation of his successor, that he was a sore saint for the crown. ”

“ I had occasion to entertain myself at Kirkwall with the melancholic prospect of the ruins of an old castle, the seat of the old Earls of Orkney, my ancestors; and of a more melancholy reflection, of so great and noble an estate as the Orkney and Shetland isles being takne from one of them by James the third for faultrie, after his brother Alexander, Duke of Albany, had married a daughter of my family, and for protecting and defending the said Alexander against the king, who wished to kill him as he had done his youngest brother, the Earl of Mar ”

“ Her lover, 'gainst her father's clan,
With Car in arms had stood,
When Mathouse burn to Melrose ran,
All purple with their blood.
And well she knew, her mother dread,
Before Lord Cranstoun she should wed,
Would see her on her dying bed.
XI.
Of noble race the Ladye came;
Her father was a clerk of fame,
Of Bethune's line of Picardie:
He learned the art, that none may name,
In Padua, far beyond the sea. ”

“ I had private intelligence given me, that there were two Scottish men, that had killed a churchman in Scotland, and were by one of the Grames relieved. This Grame dwelt within five miles of Carlisle. He had a pretty house, and close by it a strong tower, for his own defence in time of need. About two o'clock in the morning, I took horse in Carlisle, and not above 25 in my company, thinking to surprise the house on a sudden. Before I could surround the house, the two Scotts were gotten in the strong tower, and I could see a boy riding from the house as fast as his horse could carry him ”

“ Old times were changed, old manners gone,
A stranger filled the Stuarts' throne;
The bigots of the iron time
Had called his harmless art a crime.
A wandering harper, scorned and poor,
He begged his bread from door to door ”

“ Sir John Scott of Thirlestaine flourished in the reign of James V. and possessed the estates of Thirlestaine, Gamescleugh, &c. lying upon the river of Ettricke, and extending to St Mary's Loch, at the head of Yarrow. It appears that when James had assembled his nobility, and their feudal followers, at Fala, with the purpose of invading England, and was, as is well known, disappointed by the obstinate refusal of his peers, this baron alone declared himself ready to follow the king wherever he should lead. ”

“ He was a man of much learning, chiefly acquired in foreign countries. He wrote a commentary upon Aristotle, printed at Venice in 1496; and several treatises upon natural philosophy, from which he appears to have been addicted to the abstruse studies of judicial astrology, alchymy, physiognomy, and chiromancy. Hence he passed among his contemporaries for a skilful magician. Dempster informs us, that he remembers to have heard in his youth, that the magic books of Michael Scott were still in existence, but could not be opened without danger, on account of the fiends who were thereby invoked. ”

“ The beautiful chapel of Roslin is still in tolerable preservation. It was founded in 1446 by William St Clair, Prince of Orkney, Duke of Oldenbourgh, Earl of Cathnes and Stratherne, Lord Saint Clair, Lord Niddesdale, Lord Admiral of the Scottish seas, Lord Chief Justice of Scotland, Lord Warden of the three marches, Baron of Roslin, Pentland, Pentlandmoor, &c., Knight of the Cockle and of the Garter (as is affirmed) , High Chancellor, Chamberlain, and Lieutenant of Scotland. ”

“ They say that an apparition, called, in the Mankish language, the Mauthe Doog, in the shape of a large black spaniel, with curled shaggy hair, was used to haunt Peel-castle; and has been frequently seen in every room, but particularly in the guard-chamber, where, as soon as candles were lighted, it came and lay down before the fire, in presence of all the soldiers, who, at length, by being so much accustomed to the sight of it, lost great part of the terror they were seized with at its first appearance. ”

“ Be it remembered, that on the 18th day of December, 1468, Earl William Douglas assembled the whole lords, freeholders, and eldest Borderers, that best knowledge had, at the college of Linclouden; and there he caused those lords and Borderers bodily to be sworn, the Holy Gospel touched, that they justly and truly, after their cunning, should decrete, decern, deliver, and put in order and writing, the statutes, ordinances, and uses of marche, that were ordained in Black Archibald of Douglas's days, and Archibald his son's days, in time of warfare ”

“ This adventurous huntsman married Elizabeth, daughter of Malice Spar, Earl of Orkney and Stratherne, in whose right their son Henry was, in 1879, created Earl of Orkney, by Haco, king of Norway. His title was recognised by the kings of Scotland, and remained with his successors until it was annexed to the crown, in 1471, by act of parliament. In exchange for this earldom, the castle and domains of Ravenscraig, or Ravensheuch, were conferred on William Saintclair, Earl of Caithness. ”

“ The king, descending from the hill, embraced Sir William, and bestowed on him the lands of Kirkton, Loganhouse, Earncraig, &c. in free forestrie. Sir William, in acknowledgment of Saint Katherine's intercession, built the chapel of St Katherine in the Hopes, the churchyard of which is still to be seen. The hill, from which Robert Bruce beheld this memorable chace, is still called the King's Hill, and the place where Sir William hunted is called the Knight's Field [3] .—MS. History of the Family of St Clair, by Richard Augustin Hay, Canon of St Genevieve. ”

“ In addition to what has been said of the blood-hound, I may add, that the breed was kept up by the Buccleuch family on their border estates till within the 18th century. A person was alive in the memory of man, who remembered a blood-hound being kept at Eldinhope, in Ettricke Forest, for whose maintenance he tenant had an allowance of meal. At that time the sheep were always watched at night. ”

“ The slogan, or war-cry of this powerful family, was, "a Home! a Home!" It was anciently placed in an escroll above the crest. The helmet is armed with a lion's head erased gules, with a cap of state gules, turned up ermine.
The Hepburns, a powerful family in East Lothian are usually in close alliance with the Homes. The chief of this clan: was Hepburn, Lord of Hailes; a family which terminated in the too famous Earl of Bothwell.
Pursued the foot-ball play.—St. VI. p. 133.
The foot-ball was anciently a very favourite sport all through Scotland, but especially upon the Borders. ”

“ This lofty person, whose titles, says Godscroft, might weary a Spaniard, built the castle of Roslin, where he resided in princely splendour, and founded the chapel, which is in the most rich and florid stile of Gothic architecture. ”

“ A merlin, or sparrow-hawk, was usually carried by ladies of rank, as a falcon was, in time of peace, the constant attendant of a knight or baron. See Latham on Falconry.—Godscroft relates, that when Mary of Lorraine was regent, she pressed the Earl of Angus to admit a royal garrison into his castle of Tantallon. ”

“ The castle of Kirkwall was built by the St Clairs, while Earls of Orkney. It was dismantled by the Earl of Caithness about 1615, having been garrisoned against the government by Robert Stewart, natural son to the Earl of Orkney. ”

“ Spain, from the reliques, doubtless, of Arabian learning and superstition, was accounted a favourite residence of magicians. Pope Sylvester, who actually imported from Spain the use of the Arabian numerals, was supposed to have learned there the magic for which he was stigmatised by the ignorance of his age. William of Malmesbury, lib. ii. cap. 10.—There were public schools, where magic, or rather the sciences supposed to involve its mysteries, were regularly taught, at Toledo, Seville, and Salamanca. In the latter city, they were held in a deep cavern ”

“ If the classic reader enquires where Hercules himself learned magic, he may consult, "Les faicts et processes du noble et vaillant Hercules," where he will learn, that the fable of his aiding Atlas to support the heavens, arose from the said Atlas having taught Hercules, the noble knight errant, the seven liberal sciences, and, in particular, that of judicial astrology. ”

“ Michael, like his predecessor Merlin, fell at last a victim to female art. His wife, or concubine, elicited out of him the secret, that his art could ward off any danger except the poisonous qualities of broth, made of the flesh of a breme sow. ”

“ Above the flaming tide, I ween,
Scarce half the charger's neck was seen;
For he was barded [9] from counter to tail,
And the rider was armed complete in mail;
Never heavier man and horse
Stemmed a midnight torrent's force ”

“ The issue of the conflict is well known: Percy was made prisoner, and the Scots won the day, dearly purchased by the death of their gallant general, the Earl of Douglas, who was slain in the action. He was buried at Melrose beneath the high altar. "His obsequye was done reverently, and on his body layde a tombe of stone, and his baner hangyng over hym."—Froyssart, Vol. II. p. 161.
———Dark knight of Liddesdale.—St. X. p. 42.
William Douglas, called the knight of Liddesdale, flourished during the reign of David II. ”

“ The way was long, the wind was cold,
The Minstrel was infirm and old;
His withered cheek, and tresses gray,
Seemed to have known a better day; ”

“ It is a firm article of popular faith, that no enchantment can subsist in a living stream. Nay, if you can interpose a brook betwixt you, and witches, spectres, or even fiends, you are in perfect safety. ”

“ They, being transported with fury one against the other, strugled to rid themselves of the hindrance their friend made that they should not kill one another; and one of them roughly drawing the blade of his sword, cuts to the very bone the nerves and muscles of Mr Howel's hand; and then the other disengaged his hilts, and gave a crosse blow on his adversarie's head, which glanced towards his friend, who heaving up his sore hand to save the blow, he was wounded on the back of his hand as he had been before within. ”

“ Kenneth Mac-Alpin, then king of Scotland, came soon after to hunt in the royal forest, and pursued a buck from Ettricke-heuch to the glen now called Buckleuch, about two miles above the junction of Rankelburn with the river Ettricke. Here the stag stood at bay; and the king and his attendants, who followed on horseback, were thrown out by the steepness of the hill and the morass. John, one of the brethren from Galloway, had followed the chace on foot ”

“ The art of glamour, or ocular fascination, was anciently a principal part of the skill of the jongleur, or juggler, whose tricks formed much of the amusement of a Gothic castle. Some instances of this art may be found in the Minstrelsy of the Scottish Border, vol. ”

“ There is a man yet alive, who knew old men who had been baptized by these Book-a-bosomes, and who says one of them, called Hair, used this parish for a very long time."—Account of Parish of Ewes, apud Macfarlane's MSS.
It had much of glamour might.—St. IX. p. 71.
Glamour, in the legends of Scottish superstition, means the magic power of imposing on the eye-sight of spectators, so that the appearance of an object shall be totally different from the reality. To such a charm the ballad of Johnie Fa' imputes the fascination of the lovely Countess, who eloped with that gypsey leader. ”

“ I replyed, "Since then that you feel already so good effect of my medicament, I. advise you to cast away all your playsters; only keep the wound clean, and in a moderate temper betwixt heat and cold." This was presently reported to the Duke of Buckingham, and a little after to the king, who were both very curious to know the circumstance of the businesse, which was, that after dinner I took the garter out of the water, and put it to dry before a great fire. It was scarce dry, but Mr Howel's servant came running, that his master felt as much burning as ever he had done, if not more ”

“ We sent notice presently to all parts to raise the country, and to come to us with all the speed they could;.and withal we sent to Carlisle to raise the townsmen; for without foot we could do no good against the tower. There we staid some hours, expecting more company; and within short time after the country came in on all sides, so that we were quickly between three and four hundred horse; and after some longer stay, the foot of Carlisle came to us, to the number of three or four hundred men; whom we set presently at work, to get up to the top of the tower, and to uncover the roof ”

“ Notwithstanding the constant wars upon the Borders, and the occasional cruelties which marked the mutual inroads, the inhabitants on either side do not appear to have regarded each other with that violent and personal animosity which might have been expected. ”

“ A chieftain of the latter branch was warden of the west marches during the reign of Edward VI. He was a man of a hot and obstinate character, as appears from some particulars of Lord Surrey's letter to Henry VIII. giving an account of his behaviour at the siege and storm of Jedburgh. It is printed in the Minstrelsy of the Scottish Border, Appendix to the Introduction.
The German hagbut-men.—St. VI. p. 98.
In the wars with Scotland, Henry VIII. and his successors employed numerous bands of mercenary troops. ”

“ Several species of offences, peculiar to the Border, constituted what was called march-treason. Among others, was the crime of riding, or causing to ride, against the opposite country during the time of truce. Thus, in an indenture made at the water of Eske, beside Salom, the 25th day of March, 1384, betwixt noble Lords and mighty, Sirs Henry Percy, Earl of Northumberland, and Archibald of Douglas, Lord of Galoway, a truce is agreed upon until the 1st day of July ”