paid to him, saying, he surpassed the English Loth in wit and valour. This must appear to the reader a singular specimen of the humour of that time. I suspect the Jockey Club would have given a different decision from Henry IV. NOTE I. They hail'd Lord Marmion; They hail'd him Lord of Fontenaye, Of Lutterward, and Scrivelbaye, Of Tamworth tower and town.-P. 82. Lord Marmion, the principal character of the present romance, is entirely a fictitious personage. In earlier times, indeed, the family of Marmion, Lords of Fontenay, in Normandy, was highly distinguished. Robert de Marmion, Lord of Fontenay, a distinguished follower of the Conqueror, obtained a grant of the castle and town of Tamworth, and also of the manor of Scrivelby, in Lincolnshire. One, or both, of these noble possessions, was held by the honourable service of being the royal champion, as the ancestors of Marmion had formerly been to the Dukes of Normandy. But after the castle and demesne of Tamworth had passed through four successive barons from Robert, the family became extinct in the person of Philip de Marmion, who died in 20th Edward I. without issue male. He was succeeded in his castle of Tamworth by Alexander de Freville, who married Mazera, his grand-daughter. Baldwin de Freville, Alexander's descendant, in the reign of Richard I., by the supposed tenure of his castle of Tamworth, claimed the office of royal champion, and to do the service appertaining; namely, on the day of coronation, to ride, completely armed, upon a barbed horse, into Westminster Hall, and there to challenge the combat against any who would gainsay the King's title. But this office was adjudged to Sir John Dymoke, to whom the manor of Scrivelby had descended by another of the co-heiresses of Robert de Marmion; and it remains in that family, whose representative is Hereditary Champion of England at the present day. The family and possessions of Freville have merged in the Earls of Ferrars. I have not, therefore, created a new family, but only revived the titles of an old one in an imaginary personage. It was one of the Marmion family, who, in the reign of Edward II., performed that chivalrous feat before the very castle of Norham, which Bishop Percy has woven into his beautiful ballad, "The Hermit of Warkworth."-The story is thus told by Leland: "The Scottes cam yn to the marches of England, and destroyed the castles of Werk and Herbotel, and overran much of Northumberland marches. "At this tyme, Thomas Gray and his friendes defended Norham from the Scottes. "It were a wonderful processe to declare, what mischefes cam by hungre and asseges by the space of xi yeres in Northumberland; for the Scottes became so proude, after they had got Berwick, that they nothing esteemed the English men. "About this tyme there was a greate feste made yn Lincolnshir, to which came many gentlemen and ladies; and amonge them one lady brought a heaulme for a man of were, with a very riche creste of gold, to William Marmion, knight, with a letter of commandement of her lady, that he should go into the daungerest place in England, and ther to let the heaulme be seene and known as famous. So he went to Norham; whither, within 4 days of cumming, cam Philip Moubray, guardian of Berwicke, having yn his bande 40 men of armes, the very flour of men of the Scottish marches. 1 Two. "Thomas Gray, capitayne of Norham, seynge this, brought his garison afore the barriers of the castel, behind whom camı William, richly arrayed, as al glittering in gold, and wearing the heaulme, his lady's present. "Then said Thomas Gray to Marmion, Sir Knight, ye be cum hither to fame your helmet: mount up on yowr horse, and ride lyke a valiant man to yowr foes even here at hand, and I forsake God if I rescue not thy body deade or alyve, or I myself wyl dye for it." "Whereupon he toke his cursere, and rode among the throng of ennemyes; the which layed sore stripes on him, and pulled him at the last out of his sadel to the grounde. "Then Thomas Gray, with al the hole garrison, lette prick yn among the Scottes, and so wondid them and their horses, that they were overthrowan; and Marmion, sore beten, was horsid agayn, and, with Gray, persewed the Scottes yn chase. There were taken 50 horse of price; and the women of Norham brought them to the foote men to follow the chase." NOTE K. Largesse, largesse.-P. 82. This was the cry with which heralds and pursuivants were wont to acknowledge the bounty received from the knights. Stewart of Lorn distinguishes a ballad, in which he satirizes the narrowness of James V. and his courtiers, by the ironical burden "Lerges, lerges, lerges, hay, Lerges of this new-yeır day. And in my hand slid schillingis tway, 1 To put his lergnes to the prief, 2 For lerges of this new-yeir day." The heralds, like the minstrels, were a race allowed to have great claims upon the liberality of the knights, of whose feats they kept a record, and proclaimed them aloud, as in the text, upon suitable occasions. At Berwick, Norham, and other Border fortresses of importance, pursuivants usually resided, whose inviolable character rendered them the only persons that could, with perfect assurance of safety, be sent on necessary embassies into Scotland. This is alluded to in stanza xxi. p. 84. NOTE L. Sir Hugh the Heron bold, Baron of Twise!l, and of Ford, And Captain of the Hold.-P. 82. Were accuracy of any consequence in a fictitious narrative, this castellan's name ought to have been William; for Wi liam Heron of Ford was husband to the famous Lady Ford, whose siren charms are said to have cost our James IV. so dear. Moreover, the said William Heron was, at the time supposed, a prisoner in Scotland, being surrendered by Henry VIII., on account of his share in the slaughter of Sir Robert Ker of Cessford. His wife, represented in the text as residing at the Court of Scotland, was, in fact, living in her own Castle at Ford.-See Sir RICHARD HERON'S Curious Genealogy of the Heron Family. $ Proof. NOTE M. The whiles a Northern harper rude "How the fierce Thirwalls, and Ridleys all," &c.-P. 82. This old Northumbrian ballad was taken down from the recitation of a woman eighty years of age, mother of one of the miners of Alston-moor, by an agent for the lead mines there, who communicated it to my friend and correspondent, R. Surtees, Esquire, of Mainsforth. She had not, she said, heard it for many years; but, when she was a girl, it used to be sung at the merry-makings "till the roof rung again." To preserve this curious, though rude rhyme, it is here inserted. The ludicrous turn given to the slaughter, marks that wild and disorderly state of society, in which a murder was not merely a casual circumstance, but, in some cases, an exceedingly good jest. The structure of the ballad resembles the "Fray of Suport," having the same irregular stanzas and wild chorus. I. Hoot awa', lads, hoot awa', There was Willimoteswick, And Hardriding Dick, And Hughie of Hawden, and Will of the Wa', I canno' tell a', I canno' tell a', And mony a mair that the deil may knaw. II. The auld man went down, but Nicol, his son, Ran away afore the fight was begun; And he run, and he run, And afore they were done, There was many a Featherston gat sic a stun, As never was seen since the world begun. III. I canno' tell a' I canno' tell a'; Some gat a skelp, 3 and some gat a claw; But they gard the Featherstons haud their jaw,—4 Nicol, and Alick, and a'. Some gat a hurt, and some gat nane; Some had harness, and some gat sta’en.5 In explanation of this ancient ditty, Mr. Surtees has furnished me with the following local memorandum :- Willimoteswick, the chief seat of the ancient family of Ridley, is situated two miles above the confluence of the Allon and Tyne. It was a house of strength, as appears from one oblong tower, still in tolerable preservation. 13. It has been long in possession of the Blacket family. Hardriding Dick is not an epithet referring to horsemanship, but means Richard Ridley of Hardriding 4, the seat of another family of that name, which, in the time of Charles I., was sold on account of expenses incurred by the loyalty of the proprietor, the immediate ancestor of Sir Matthew Ridley. Will of the Wa' seems to be William Ridley of Walltown, so called from its situation on the great Roman wall. Thirlwall Castle, whence the clan of Thirlwalls derived their name, is situated on the small river of Tippel, near the western boundary of Northumberland. It is near the wall, and takes its name from the rampart having been thirled, i. e. pierced, or breached, in its vicinity. Featherston Castle lies south of the Tyne, towards Alston-moor. Albany Featherstonhaugh, the chief of that ancient family, made a figure in the reign of Edward VI. A feud did certainly exist between the Ridleys and Featherstons, productive of such consequences as the ballad narrates. 24 Oct. 22do Henrici 8vi. Inquisitio capt. apud Hautwhistle, sup visum corpus Alexandri Featherston, Gen. apud Grensilhaugh felonice interfecti, 22 Oct. per Nicolaum Ridley de Unthanke, Gen. Hugon Ridle, Nicolaum Rille, et alios ejusdem nominis. Nor were the Featherstons without their revenge; for 36to Henrici 8vi, we have-Ullagatio Nicolai Fetherston, ac Thome Nyxson, &c. &c. pro homicidio Will. Ridle de Morale. 1 See Minstrelsy of the Scottish Border, vol. ii. p. 124. * Pronounced Awbony. 11 The Bailiff of Halt whistle seems to have arrived when the fray was over. This supporter of social order is treated with 3 Skelp signifies slap, or rather is the same word which was characteristic irreverence by the moss-trooping poet. originally spelled schlap. 4 Hold their jaw, a vulgar expression still in use. 12 An iron pot with two ears. 18 Willimoteswick was, in prior editions, confounded with 5 Got stolen, or, were plundered; a very likely termination Ridley Hall, situated two miles lower, on the same side of of the fray. the Tyne, the hereditary seat of William C. Lowes, Esq. 14 Ridley, the bishop and martyr, was, according to some authorities, born at Hardriding, where a chair was preserved, called the Bishop's Chair. Others, and particularly his biographer and namesake Dr. Glocester Ridley, assign the ho nour of the martyr's birth to Willimoteswick. land; and James IV., after conferring upon him in marriage his own relation, the Lady Catharine Gordon, made war on England in behalf of his pretensions. To retaliate an invasion of England, Surrey advanced into Berwickshire at the head of considerable forces, but retreated, after taking the inconsiderable fortress of Ayton. Ford, in his Dramatic Chronicle of Perkin Warbeck, makes the most of this inroad: "SURREY. "Are all our braving enemies shrunk back, insurgents in 1549. "This man," says Hollinshed, “lad many good things in him. He was of no great stature, but well set, and mightilie compact: He was a very good wrest ler; shot well, both in the long bow and also in the crossbow; he handled his hand-gun and peece very well; he was a very good woodman, and a hardie, and such a one as would not give his head for the polling, or his beard for the washing. He was a companion in any exercise of activitie, and of a courteous and gentle behaviour. He descended of a good honest parentage, being borne at Peneverin in Cornwall; and yet, in this rebellion, an arch-captain and a principal doer." -Vol. iv. p. 938, 4to. edition. This model of clerical talents had the misfortune to be hanged upon the steeple of his own church.1 NOTE O. I trox, Norham can find you guides enow ; The garrisons of the English castles of Wark, Norham, and Berwick, were, as may be easily supposed, very troublesome neighbours to Scotland. Sir Richard Maitland of Ledington wrote a poem, called "The Blind Baron's Comfort;" when his barony of Blythe, in Lauderdale, was harried by Rowland Foster, the English captain of Wark, with his company, to the number of 30 men. They spoiled the poetical knight of 5000 sheep, 200 nolt, 30 horses and mares; the whole furniture of his house of Blythe, worth 100 pounds Scots, (£8, 6s. 8d.), and every thing else that was portable. "This spoil was committed the 16th day of May 1570, (and the said Sir Richard was threescore and fourteen years of age, and grown blind), in time of peace; when nane of that country lippened [expected] such a thing."-"The Blind Baron's Comfort" consists in a string of puns on the word Blythe, the name of the lands thus despoiled. Like John Littlewit, he had "a conceit left in his misery-a miserable conceit." The last line of the text contains a phrase, by which the Borderers jocularly intimated the burning a house. When the Maxwells, in 1685, burned the Castle of Lochwood, they said they did so to give the Lady Johnstone "light to set her hood" Nor was the phrase inapplicable; for, in a letter, to which I have mislaid the reference, the Earl of Northumberland writes to the King and Council, that he dressed himself at midnight, at Warkworth, by the blaze of the neighbouring villages burned by the Scottish marauders. NOTE P. The priest of Shoreswood—he could rein The wildest war-horse in your train.-P. 84. This churchman seems to have been akin to Welsh, the vicar of St. Thomas of Exeter, a leader among the Cornish NOTE Q. -that Grot where Olives nod, Where, darling of each heart and eye, From all the youth of Sicily, Saint Rosalie retired to God.—P. 84. "Sante Rosalia was of Palermo, and born of a very noble family, and, when very young, abhorred so much the vanities of this world, and avoided the converse of mankind, resolving to dedicate herself wholly to God Almighty, that she, by divine inspiration, forsook her father's house, and never was more heard of till her body was found in that cleft of a rock. on that almost inaccessible mountain, where now the chapel is built; and they affirm she was carried up there by the bands of angels; for that place was not formerly so accessible (as now it is) in the days of the Saint; and even now it is a very bad, and steepy, and breakneck way. In this frightful place, this holy woman lived a great many years, feeding only on what she found growing on that barren mountain, and creeping into a narrow and dreadful cleft in a rock, which was always dropping wet, and was her place of retirement as well as prayer; having worn out even the rock with her knees in a certain place, which is now open'd on purpose to show it to those who come here. This chapel is very richly adorn'd; and on the spot where the Saint's dead body was discover'd, which is just beneath the hole in the rock, which is open'd on purpose, as I said, there is a very fine statue of marble, representing her in a lying posture, railed in all about with fine iron and brass work; and the altar, on which they say mass, is built just over it."-Voyage to Sicily and Malta, by Mr. John Dryden (son to the poet), p. 107. Friar John NOTE R. Himself still sleeps before his beads Have mark'd ten aves and two creeds.—P. 85, Friar John understood the soporific virtue of his beads and breviary, as well as his namesake in Rabelais. "But Gargantua could not sleep by any means, on which side soever he turned himself. Whereupon the monk said to him, '1 never sleep soundly but when I am at sermon or prayers: Let us therefore begin, you and I, the seven penitential psalms, to try whether you shall not quickly fall asleep.' The conceit pleased Gargantua very well; and beginning the first of these psalms, as soon as they came to Beati quorum, they fell asleep, both the one and the other." 1 The reader needs hardly to be reminded of Ivanhoe. NOTE S. The summon'd Palmer came in place.-P. 35. A Palmer, opposed to a Pilgrim, was one who made it his sole business to visit different holy shrines; travelling incessantly, and subsisting by charity: whereas the Pilgrim retired to his usual home and occupations, when he had paid his devotions at the particular spot which was the object of his pilgrimage. The Palmers seem to have been the Questionarii of the ancient Scottish canons 1242 and 1296. There is in the Bannatyne MS. a burlesque account of two such persons, entitled, "Simmy and his brother." Their accoutrements are thus ludicrously described, (I discard the ancient spelling) Syne shaped them up, to loup on leas, Two tabards of the tartan; Made of an old red gartane; St. James's shells, on t' other side, shows Toe, On Symmye and his brother." NOTE T. To fair St. Andrews bound, Within the ocean-cave to pray, Where good Saint Rule his holy lay, From midnight to the dawn of day, Sung to the billows' sound.-P. 86. A St. Regulus (Scotticé, St. Rule), a monk of Patræ, in Achaia, warned by a vision, is said, A.D. 370, to have sailed westward, until he landed at St. Andrews in Scotland, where he founded a chapel and tower. The latter is still standing; and, though we may doubt the precise date of its foundation, is certainly one of the most ancient edifices in Scotland. cave, nearly fronting the ruinous castle of the Archbishops of St. Andrews, bears the name of this religious person. It is difficult of access; and the rock in which it is hewed is washed by the German Ocean. It is nearly round, about ten feet in diameter, and the same in height. On one side is a sort of stone altar; on the other an aperture into an inner den, where the miserable ascetic, who inhabited this dwelling, probably slept. At full tide, egress and regress are hardly practicable. As Regulus first colonized the metropolitan see of Scotland, and converted the inhabitants in the vicinity, he has some reason to complain, that the ancient name of Killrule (Cella Reguli should have been superseded, even in favour of the tutelar saint of Scotland. The reason of the change was, that St. Rule is said to have brought to Scotland the relics of Saint Andrew. NOTE U. Saint Fillan's blessed well, Whose spring can frenzied dreams displ, And the crazed brain restore.-P.. St. Fillan was a Scottish saint of some reputation. Although Popery is, with us, matter of abomination, yet the common people still retain some of the superstitions connected with it. There are in Perthshire several wells and springs dedi cated to St. Fillan, which are still pinces of pilgrimage at a offerings, even among the Protestants. They are held powerful in cases of madness; and, in some of very late occurrence. lunatics have been left all night bound to the holy stone, in confidence that the saint would cure and unloose them before morning.- [See various notes to the Minstrelsy of the Scottish Border.] NOTE V. The scenes are desert now, and bare, Where flourish'd once a forest fair.-P. 86. Ettrick Forest, now a range of mountainous sheep-walks, was anciently reserved for the pleasure of the royal chase. Since it was disparked, the wood has been, by degrees, almost totally destroyed, although, wherever protected from the sheep, copses soon arise without any planting. When the King hunted there, he often summoned the array of the country to meet and assist his sport. Thus, in 1528, James V. "made proclamation to all lords, barons. gentlemen, landward-men, and freeholders, that they should compear at Edinburgh, with a month's victuals, to pass with the King where he pleased, to danton the thieves of Tiviotdale, Annandale, Liddisdale, and other parts of that country; and also warned all gentlerien that had good dogs to bring them, that he might hunt in the said country as he pleased: The whilk the Earl of Argyle, the Earl of Huntley, the Earl of Athole, and so all the rest of the gentlemen of the Highland, did, and brought their hounds with them in like manner, to hunt with the King, as he pleased. "The second day of June the King past out of Edinburgh to the hunting, with many of the nobles and gentlemen of Scotland with him, to the number of twelve thousand men; and then past to Meggitland, and hounded and hawked all the country and bounds; that is to say, Crammat. Pappertlaw, St. Mary-laws, Carlavrick, Chapel, Ewindoores, and Longhope. I heard say, he slew, in these bounds, eighteen score of harts.” i These huntings had, of course, a military character, and attendance upon them was a part of the duty of a vassal. The act for abolishing ward or military tenures in Scotland, enumerates the services of hunting, hosting, watching, and warding, as those which were in future to be illegal. Taylor, the water-poet, has given an account of the mode in which these huntings were conducted in the Highlands of Scotland, in the seventeenth century, having been present at Bræmar upon such an occasion: "There did I find the truly noble and right honourable lords, John Erskine, Earl of Mar; James Stewart, Earl of Murray; George Gordon, Earl of Engye, son and heir to the Marquis of Huntley; James Erskine, Earl of Buchan; and John, Lord Erskine, son and heir to the Earl of Mar, and their Countesses, with my much honoured, and my last assured and approved friend, Sir William Murray, knight of Abercarney, and hundreds of others, knights, esquires, and their followers, all and every man, in general, in one habit, as if Lycurgus had been there, and made laws of equality; for once in the year, which is the whole month of August, and sometimes part of September, many of the nobility and gentry of the kingdom (for their pleasure) do come into these Highland countries to hunt; where they do conform themselves to the habit of the Highlandmen, who, for the most part, speak rothing but Irish; and, in former time, were those people which were called the Red-shanks. Their habit is-shoes, with but one sole a-picce; stockings (which they ! PITSCOTTIE'S History of Scotland, folio edition, p. 143 NOTE W. By lone Saint Mary's silent lake.-P. 88. This beautiful sheet of water forms the reservoir from which the Yarrow takes its source. It is connected with a smaller tains. In the winter, it is still frequented by flights of wild swans; hence my friend Mr. Wordsworth's lines:— call short hose,) made of a warm stuff of diverse colours, which they call tartan; as for breeches, many of them, nor their forefathers, never wore any, but a jerkin of the same stuff that their hose is of; their garters being bands or wreaths of hay or straw; with a plaid about their shoulders; which is a mantle of diverse colours, much finer and lighter stuff than their hose; with blue flat caps on their heads; a handker-lake, called the Loch of the Lowes, and surrounded by moun chief, knit with two knots, about their necks: and thus are they attired. Now their weapons are-long bowes and forked arrows, swords and targets, harquebusses, muskets, durks, and Lochaber axes. With these arms I found many of them armed for the hunting. As for their attire, any man, of what degree soever, that comes amongst them, must not disdain to to wear it; for, if they do, then they will disdain to hunt, or willingly to bring in their dogs; but if men be kind unto them, and be in their habit, then are they conquered with kindness, and the sport will be plentiful. This was the reason that I found so many noblemen and gentlemen in those shapes. But to proceed to the hunting: "My good Lord of Marr having put me into that shape, I rode with him from his house, where I saw the ruins of an old castle, called the Castle of Kindroghit. It was built by King Malcolm Canmore (for a hunting-house,) who reigned in Scotland, when Edward the Confessor, Harold, and Norman William, reigned in England. I speak of it, because it was the last house I saw in those parts; for I was the space of twelve days after, before I saw either house, corn-field, or habitation for any creature, but deer, wild horses, wolves, and such like creatures,-which made me doubt that I should never have seen a house again. "Thus, the first day, we travelled eight miles, where there were small cottages, built on purpose to lodge in, which they call Lonquhards. I thank my good Lord Erskine, he commanded that I should always be lodged in his lodging: the kitchen being always on the side of a bank: many kettles and pots boiling, and many spits turning and winding, with great variety of cheer,-as venison baked; sodden, rost, and stewed beef; mutton, goats, kid, hares, fresh salmon, pigeons, hens, capons, chickens, partridges, muir-coots, heath-cocks, caperkellies, and termagants; good ale, sacke, white and claret, tent (or allegant), with most potent aquavitæ. "All these, and more than these, we had continually in superfluous abundance, caught by falconers, fowlers, fishers, and brought by my lord's tenants and purveyors to victual our camp, which consisteth of fourteen or fifteen hundred men and horses. The manner of the hunting is this: Five or six hundred men do rise early in the morning, and they do disperse themselves divers ways, and seven, eight, or ten miles compass, they do bring, or chase in, the deer in many herds (two, three, or four hundred in a herd,) to such or such a place, as the noblemen shall appoint them; then, when day is come, the lords and gentlemen of their companies do ride or go to the said places, sometimes wading up to the middles, through burns and rivers; and then, they being come to the place, do lie down on the ground, till those foresaid scouts, which are called the Tinkhell, do bring down the deer; but, as the proverb says of the bad cook, so these tinkhell men do lick their own fingers; for, besides their bows and arrows, which they carry with them, we can hear, now and then, a harquebuss or a musket go off, which they do seldom discharge in vain. Then, after we had staid there three hours, or thereabouts, we might perceive the deer appear on the hills round about us (their heads making a show like a wood,) which, being followed close by the tinkhell, are chased down into the valley where we lay; then all the valley, on each side, being way-laid with a hundred couple of strong Irish greyhounds, they are all let loose, as occasion serves, upon the herd of deer, that with dogs, guns, arrows, durks, and daggers, in the space of two hours, fourscore fat deer were slain; which after are disposed of, some one way, and some another, twenty and thirty miles, and more than enough left for us, to make merry withall, at our rendezvous." "The swan on sweet St. Mary's lake Near the lower extremity of the lake, are the ruins of Dryhope tower, the birth place of Mary Scott, daughter of Philip Scott of Dryhope, and famous by the traditional name of the Flower of Yarrow. She was married to Walter Scott of Harden, no less renowned for his depredations, than his bride for her beauty. Her romantic appellation was, in later days, with equal justice, conferred on Miss Mary Lilias Scott, the last of the elder branch of the Harden family. The author well remembers the talent and spirit of the latter Flower of Yarrow, though age had then injured the charms which procured her the name. The words usually sung to the air of "Tweedside," beginning, "What beauties does Flora disclose," were composed in her honour. NOTE X. in feudal strife, a foe, Hath laid Our Lady's chapel low.-P. 88. The chapel of St. Mary of the Lowes (de lacuous) was situated on the eastern side of the lake, to which it gives name. It was injured by the clan of Scott, in a feud with the Cranstouns; but continued to be a place of worship during the seventeenth century. The vestiges of the building can now scarcely be traced; but the burial ground is still used as a cemetry. A funeral, in a spot so very retired, has an uncommonly striking effect. The vestiges of the chaplain's house are yet visible. Being in a high situation, it commanded a full view of the lake, with the opposite mountain of Bourhope, belong. ing, with the lake itself, to Lord Napier. On the left hand is the tower of Dryhope, mentioned in a preceding note. NOTE Y. -the Wizard's grave; That Wizard Priest's, whose bones are thrust At one corner of the burial ground of the demolished chapel, but without its precincts, is a small mound, called Binram's Corse, where tradition deposits the remains of a necromantic priest, the former tenant of the chaplainry. His story much resembles that of Ambrosio in "The Monk," and has been made the theme of a ballad, by my friend Mr. James Hogg, more poetically designed the Ettrick Shepherd. To his volume, entitled "The Mountain Bard," which contains this, and many other legendary stories and ballads of great merit. I refer the curious reader. |