Royal Edinburgh Part 3

He betrayed to the Bishop his weariness of the ever-renewed struggle, and of the falsehood and treachery which, even if victorious, were all he had to encounter, the failure of every pledge and promise, the faith sworn one day which failed him the next, and the deep discouragement with all things round him which had taken possession of his mind. The wise prelate heard this confession of heart-sickness and despondency, and with a fatherly familiarity bade the young King sit down to meat, which he much wanted, while he himself went to his oratory to pray for enlightenment. That James thought no less than to throw up the struggle and retire from his kingdom, is what the old writers say. But when, with his bosom lightened by utterance of his trouble, and his courage a little restored by food and rest, the Bishop came back to him with a cheerful countenance from his prayers, the King took heart again.

Kennedy produced to him the old image of the sheaf of arrows which, bound together, were not to be broken, but one by one could easily be snapt asunder, and advised him to make proclamation of a free pardon to all who would throw down their arms and make submission, and to march at once against the rebel host with full confidence of victory. Inspired by this advice, and by the companionship of the Bishop who went with him, the King set out to meet the rebels, though with an army inferior in number to theirs. Douglas, from some unexplained reason, wavered and hesitated, taking no active step, and gave Bishop Kennedy time to put his own suggestion in practice in respect to his nephew Lord Hamilton--who was one of Douglas's chief supporters--sending secret messengers to him to urge him to submission. Hamilton no doubt had already perceived signs of wavering purpose and insecurity in the heterogeneous host, in which were many whose hearts failed them at sight of the King's banners--men who were apt to rebellion without being wound up to the extreme point of civil war: but he had "ane kyndlie love to Earl Douglas" as well as a regard for his own honour, and would not lightly desert his friend. While thus uncertain he appealed to Douglas to know what he meant to do, warning him that the longer he hesitated, the less would be the forces at his disposal. Douglas replied haughtily that if he were tired of waiting he might go when he pleased--an indiscreet answer, which decided Hamilton to withdraw and throw himself upon the King's promised mercy. The same night he went over to the royal army, carrying with him so many that "on the morn thereafter the Earl Douglas had not ane hunder men by his own household," the whole host having melted away. Never was a greater risk for a monarchy nor a more easy and bloodless escape. The Earl fled to the depths of his own country and thence to England, where he lived long a pensioned dependant, after all his greatness and ambition, to reappear in history only like a ghost after many silent years.

Amid all these bewildering and bitter struggles, in which much misery was no doubt involved, it is recorded of the King that he never lost his humane character, and that even in the devastations he was forced to sanction or command, the cruel reprisals carried out over all the south of Scotland, his severity was always tempered with mercy. "He was not so much feared as a king as loved like a father," says Major. This luminous trait appears through all the darkness of the vexed and furious time.

The King was always ready to pardon at a word, to believe in the vows and receive the submission of the fiercest rebels. One curious evidence of the confidence felt in him was shown by the widow of the murdered Earl, Margaret Douglas, the Maid of Galloway, a woman doubly injured in every relation--the sister of the young Earl murdered at Edinburgh, married by his successor in order to reunite the Douglas patrimony, a great portion of which went to her as her brother's heir--and again forced into another and unlawful marriage by her husband's brother, immediately upon his death, for the same end. James received this fugitive kindly, restored to her part of the lands of her family, and finally married her--thus freeing her from the lawless bond into which she had been driven--to his own step-brother, John, Earl of Atholl, "the Black Knight of Lorne's son;" upon hearing of which another fugitive of a similar description appeared upon the scene.

"When the Earl of Ross's wyff understood the King to be some pairt favourable to all that sought his grace she fled also under his protection to eschew the cruel tyranny of her husband, which she dreaded sometyme before. The King called to remembrance that this woman was married not by her own counsel to Donald of the Isles (the Earl of Ross). He gave her also sufficient lands and living whereon she might live according to her estate."

The case of women, and especially heiresses, in that lawless age must have been miserable indeed. Bandied about from one marriage to another, forced to accept such security as a more or less powerful lord could give, and when he was killed to fall victim to the next who could seize upon her, or to whom she should be allotted by feudal suzerain or chieftain, the mere name of a king who did not disdain a woman's plaint, but had compa.s.sion and help to give, must have conveyed hope to many an unhappy lady bound to a repugnant life. James would seem to have been the only man who recognised the misery to which such unconsidered items in the wild and tumultuous course of affairs might be driven.

Thus King James and Scotland with him were delivered from the greatest and most dangerous of the powerful houses that held the country in fear.

Shortly after he conquered, partly by arms, partly by the strain of a universal impulse, which seemed to rouse the barons to a better way, those great allies in the north who held the key of the Highlands, the Earl of Crawford and the Earl of Ross, so that at last something of a common rule and common sentiment began to move the country. It is almost needless to say that James took advantage of this temporary unity and enthusiasm in order to invade England--a thing without which no Scots King could be said to be happy. The negotiations by which he was at once stimulated and hindered--among others by amba.s.sadors from the Duke of York to ask his help against Henry VI, with orders to arrest his army on their way--are too complicated to be entered upon; but at last the Scots forces set out and, after various successes, James found himself before Roxburgh, a town and castle which had remained in the hands of the English from the time when the Earl of March deserted his country for England in the reign of Robert III. The town was soon taken, but the castle, in which there was a brave garrison, stood out manfully. This invasion of the Borders, and opportunity of striking a blow at the "auld enemy," was evidently an act of the highest policy while yet the surgings of civil war were not entirely quieted, and a diversion of ideas as well as new opportunities of spoil were peculiarly necessary.

Its first excellent result was that Donald of the Isles, the Earl of Ross and terror of the north country, whose submission had been but provisionally accepted, and depended upon some evidence of real desire for the interest of the common weal, suddenly appeared with "ane great armie of men, all armed in the Highland fashion," and claimed the vanguard, the place of honour, and to be allowed to take upon him "the first press and dint of the battell." James received this unexpected auxiliary with "great humanitie," but prudently provided, before accepting his offer, which apparently, however, was made in all good faith, that Donald should "stent his pavilliones a little by himself,"

until full counsel had been taken on the subject. The army was also joined by "a great company of stout and chosen men," under the Earl of Huntly, whose coming "made the King so blyth that he commanded to charge all the guns and give the castle ane new volie." James would seem throughout to have felt the greatest interest in the extraordinary new arm of artillery which had made a revolution in warfare. He pursued siege after siege with a zeal in which something of the ardour of a military enthusiast and scientific inquirer mingled with the necessities of the struggle in which he was engaged. The "Schort Cronikle," already quoted, describes him as lingering over the siege of Abercorn, "striking mony of the towers down with the gret gun, the whilk a Franche man shot richt wele, and failed na shot within a fathom where it was charged him to hit." And when, in the exultation of his heart to see each new accession of force come in, he ordered "a new volie" against the stout outstanding walls, the excitement of the discharge, the eagerness of an adept to watch the effect, no doubt made this dangerous expression of satisfaction a real demonstration of pleasure.

[Ill.u.s.tration: MONS MEG]

King James had attained at this time a success which probably a few years before his warmest imagination could not have aspired to. He had brought into subjection the great families which had almost contested his throne with him. Douglas, the highest and most near himself, had been swept clean out of his way. The fiercest rebel of all, the head of the Highland caterans, with his wild host in all their savage array, was by his side, ready to charge under his orders. The country, drained of its most lawless elements, was beginning to breathe again, to sow its fields and rebuild its homesteads. Instead of the horrors of civil war his soldiers were now engaged in the most legitimate of all enterprises--the attempt to recover from England an alienated possession. Everything was bright before him, the hope of a great reign, the promise of prosperity and honour and peace.

It is almost a commonplace of human experience that in such moments the blow of fate is near at hand. The big guns which were a comparatively new wonder, full of interest in their unaccustomed operation, were still a danger as well as a prodigy, and James would seem to have forgotten the precautions that were considered necessary in presence of an armament still only partially understood. The historian a.s.sumes, as every human observer is apt to do in face of such a calamity, a tone of blame. "This Prince," says the chronicle with a shrill tone of exasperation in the record of the catastrophe, "more curious than became the majestie of a king, did stand hard by when the artilliarie was discharging." And in a moment all the labours and struggles, and the hope of the redeemed kingdom and all the prosperity that was to come, were at an end. One can imagine the sudden dismay in the group around him, the rush of his attendants, his own feeble command to keep silence when some cry of horror rose from the pale-faced circle. His thigh had been broken, "dung in two," by the explosion of the gun, "by which he was struken to the ground, and died hastilie thereafter," with no time to say more than to order silence, lest the army should be discouraged and the siege prove in vain.

So ended the troublous reign of the second James, involved in strife and warfare from his childhood, vexed by the treacheries and struggles over him of his dearest friends, full of violence alien to his mind and temper, which yet was justified by his example at the most critical moment of his life. He made his way through continual contention, intrigue, and blood, for which he was not to blame, to such a settlement of national affairs as might have consolidated Scotland and made her great--by patience and firmness and courage, and conspicuously by mercy, notwithstanding one crime. And when the helm was in his hands, and a fair future before him, fell, not ignominiously indeed, yet uselessly, a n.o.ble life thrown away, leaving once more chaos behind him. He was only twenty-nine when the thunderbolt thus falling from a clear sky destroyed all the hopes of Scotland; yet had reigned long, for twenty-three years of trouble, tumult, and distress.

CHAPTER III

JAMES III: THE MAN OF PEACE

Again the noises cease save for a wail of lamentation over the dead. The operations of war are suspended, the dark ranks of the army stand aside, and every trumpet and fatal cannon is silent while once more a woman and a child come into the foreground of the historic scene. Once more, the most pathetic figure surely in history, a little startled boy clinging to his mother--not afraid indeed of the array of war to which he has been accustomed all his life, and perhaps with an instinct in him of childish majesty, the consciousness which so soon develops even in an infant mind, of unquestioned rank, but surrounded by the atmosphere of horror and affright in which he has been taken from among his playthings--stands forth to be hastily enveloped in the robes so pitifully over-large of the dead monarch. The lords, we are told, sent for the Prince in the first sensation of the catastrophe, and had him crowned at Kelso, feeling the necessity of that central name at least, round which to rally. They were not always respectful of the real King when they had him, yet the divinity which hedged the t.i.tle, however helpless the head round which it shone, was felt to be indispensable to the unity and strength of the kingdom. Mary of Gueldres in her sudden widowhood would seem to have behaved with great dignity and spirit at this critical moment. She is said to have insisted that the siege should not be abandoned, but that her husband's death might at least accomplish what his heart had been set upon; and the army after a moment of despondency was so "incouraged" by the coming of the Prince "that they forgot the death of his father and past manfullie to the hous, and wan the same, and justified the captaine theroff, and kest it down to the ground that it should not be any impediment to them hereafter." The execution of the captain seems a hard measure unless he was a traitor to the Scottish crown; but no doubt the conflict became more bitter from the terrible cost of the victory.

[Ill.u.s.tration: THE CANONGATE TOLBOOTH]

Once more accordingly the kingdom was thrown into the chaos which in those days attended a long minority, the struggle for power, the relaxation of order, and all the evils that follow when one firm hand full of purpose drops the reins which half a dozen conflicting compet.i.tors scramble for. There was not, at first at least, anything of the foolish anarchy which drove Scotland into confusion during the childhood of James II, and opened the way to so many subsequent disasters, for Bishop Kennedy, the dead King's chief counsellor and support and a man universally trusted, was in the front of affairs, influencing if not originating all that was done: and to him, almost as a matter of course, the education of the little heir was at once confided. But Mary of Gueldres was a woman of resolution and force, and did not give up without a struggle her pretensions to the regency.

Buchanan relates a scene which, according to his history, took place in Edinburgh on the occasion of the first Parliament after James's death.

The Queen had established herself in the castle while Kennedy was in Holyrood, probably with his little pupil, but there is no mention made of James. On the second day of the Parliament Mary appeared suddenly in what would seem to have been, according to modern phraseology, "a packed house," her own partisans having no doubt been warned to be present by the action of some energetic "whip," and was, then and there, by a hasty Act, carried through at one sitting, appointed guardian and Regent, after which summary success she returned with great pomp to her apartments, though with what hope of having really attained a tenable position it is impossible to say. When the news was carried to Holyrood, Bishop Kennedy in his turn appeared before the Estates, which had been thus taken by surprise. It is evident that the populace of Edinburgh was excited by what had occurred--Mary's partisans no doubt rejoicing, while the people in general, always jealous of a foreigner and never very respectful of a woman, surged through the great line of street towards the castle with all the fury of a popular tumult. The High Street of Edinburgh was not unaccustomed to sudden encounters, clashing of swords between two pa.s.sing lords, each with fierce followers, and all the risks of sudden brawls when neither would concede the "crown of the causeway."

But the townsfolk seldom did more than look on, with perhaps an ill-concealed satisfaction in the wounds inflicted by their natural opponents upon each other. On this occasion, however, the tumult was a popular one, involving the interests of the citizens; and it is difficult to believe that the inclinations of the townsfolk would not rather lean towards the Queen, a woman of wealth and stately surroundings, likely to entertain princes and great personages and to fill Edinburgh with the splendour of a Court, than to the prelate, although his tastes also were magnificent, whose metropolis was not Edinburgh but St. Andrews, and who might consider frugality and sobriety the best qualities for the Court of a minor. At all events the crowd had risen and was ripe for tumult, when Bishop Kennedy persuaded them to pause, and reminded them of the mutual forbearance and patience and quiet which was above all necessary at such a troublous time. Other prelates would seem to have been in his train, for we are told it was the intercessions and explanations of "the bishops" which prevented the tumult from rising into a fight. The parties would seem to have been so strong, and so evenly divided, that the question was finally solved by a compromise, Parliament appointing a council of guardians, two on each side: Seaton and Boyd for the Queen; John Kennedy, brother of the Bishop, and the Earl of Orkney, for the others--an experiment which was no more successful than in the previous minority.

The Queen-mother had soon, however, something to occupy her leisure in the visit, if visit it can be called, of Henry VI and his Queen and household, fugitives before the victorious party of York, who had sought refuge from the Scots, and lodging for a thousand attendants--a request which was granted, and the convent of the Greyfriars allotted to them as their residence. The Queen at the Castle would thus be a near neighbour of the royal fugitives, and it is interesting to think of the meeting, the sympathy and mutual condolences of the two women. Margaret, the fervid Provencal, with her pa.s.sionate sense of wrong and restless energy, and the hopeless task she had of maintaining and inspiring to play his part with any dignity her too patient and gentle king; and Mary, the fair and placid Fleming, stung too in her pride and affections by the refusal of the regency, and her subordination to those riotous and unmannerly lords and the proud Bishop who had got the affairs of Scotland in his hand. The two Queens might have had some previous acquaintance with each other, at a time when both had fairer hopes; at all events they amused themselves sadly, as they sat and talked together, with fancies such as please women, of making a marriage between the little Edward, the future victim of Tewkesbury, then a child at his mother's knee, and the little Princess of Scotland who played beside him, in the good days when all these troubles should be past, and Henry or his son after him should have regained the English crown. One follows with regretful interest the n.o.ble figure of Margaret, under the guise in which that sworn Lancastrian Shakspeare has disclosed it to us, before her sweeter mood had disappeared under the pressure of fate, and when not curses but hopes came from her mouth in her young motherhood, and every recovery and restoration, and happy marriage and royal state, were possible for her boy. Mary too had been cut off in the middle of her greatness. They were two Queens discrowned, two fair heads veiled with misfortune, though nothing irremediable had as yet happened, nothing that should make the future a desert though the present might be dark; ready to live again in their children, and make premature treaties over the little blonde heads at their knee. So natural a scene comes in strangely to the records of violence and misery. Nothing more tragic could be than the fate of Margaret; and the splendour and happiness had been very shortlived in Mary's experience, soon quenched in sudden destruction; but to see the two young mothers planning over the heads of the little ones how the two kingdoms were to be united, and happiness come back in a future that was never to be, while they sat together in brief companionship in those strait rooms of Edinburgh Castle, which were so narrow and so poor for a queen's habitation, or within the precincts of the Greyfriars, looking out upon the peaceful Pentlands and the soft hills of Braid, is like the recurring melody in a piece of stormy music, the bit of light in a tempestuous picture. It teaches us to perceive that, however the firmament of a kingdom may be torn with storms, there are everywhere about, even in queens' chambers, scenes of tenderness and peace.

Mary died in her own foundation of Trinity College Hospital--the beautiful church of which was demolished within living memory--three years after her husband, while her children were still very young: and thus all further struggles about the regency were ended. She does not seem indeed ever to have repeated her one stand for power. Bishop Kennedy, we may well believe, was not a man with whom there would be easy fighting. His sway procured a little respite for Scotland in the ordinary miseries of her career. The Douglases were safely out of the way and ended, and there was a truce of fifteen years with England which kept danger from that side at arm's length--not, the chroniclers a.s.sure us, from any additional love between the two countries, but because "the Inglish had warres within themselves daylie, stryvand for the crown."

Kennedy lived some years after the Queen, guiding all the affairs of the kingdom so wisely that "the commounweill flourished greatly." He was a Churchman of the n.o.blest kind, full of care for the spiritual interests of his diocese as well as for the secular affairs which were placed in his hands. "He caused all persones (parsons) and vicars to remain at their paroche kirks," says Pitscottie, "for the instruction and edifying of their flocks: and caused them preach the Word of G.o.d to the people and visit them that were sick; and also the said Bishope visited every kirk within the diocese four times in the year, and preached to the said parochin himself the Word of G.o.d, and inquired of them if they were dewly instructed by their parson and vicar, and if the poor were sustained and the youth brought up and learned according to the order that was taine in the house of G.o.d."

With all this, and many other gifts beside, among which are noted the knowledge he had of the "civil laws, having practised in the same," and his experience and sagacity in all public affairs--he was a scholar and loved all the arts. "He founded," says Pitscottie, "ane triumphant college in Sanct Androis, called Sanct Salvatore's College, wherein he made his lear (library) very curiouslie and coastlie; and also he biggit ane ship, called the Bishop's Barge, and when all three were complete, to wit, the college, the lear, and the barge, he knew not which of the three was the costliest; for it was reckoned for the time by honest men of consideration that the least of the three cost him ten thousand pound sterling." Major gives the same high character of the great Bishop, declaring that there were but two things in him which did not merit approval--the fact that he held a priory (but only one, that of Pittenweem) _in commendam_, "and the sumptuositie of his sepulchre."

That sepulchre, half destroyed--after having remained a thing of beauty for three hundred years--by ignorant and foolish hands in the end of the eighteenth century, may still be seen in the chapel of his college at St. Andrews, the only existing memorial of the time when all Scotland was governed from that stormy headland to the great advantage of the commonwealth. It is difficult to make out from the different records whether the young King remained in the Bishop's keeping so long as he lived, which was but until James had attained the age of thirteen, or whether the usual struggle between the two sets of guardians appointed by Parliament, the Boyds and Kennedies, had begun before the Bishop's death. It may be imagined, however, that the evident advantages to the boy of Bishop Kennedy's care would outweigh any formal appointment; although at the same time the idea suggests itself whether in the perversity of human nature this training was not in itself partly the cause of James's weaknesses and errors. He would learn at St. Andrews not only what was best in the learning of the time, but as much of the arts as were known in Scotland, and especially that n.o.ble art of architecture, which has been the pa.s.sion of so many princes. And no doubt he would see the advancement of professors of these arts, of men skilful and cunning in design and decoration, the builders, the sculptors, and the musicians, whose place in the great cathedral could never be unimportant. A Churchman could promote and honour such public servants in the little commonwealth of his cathedral town with greater freedom than might be done elsewhere; and James, a studious and feeble boy, not wise enough to see that the example of his great teacher was here inappropriate and out of place, learned this lesson but too well.

The King grew up "a man that loved solitariness and desired never to hear of warre, but delighted more in musick and politie and building nor he did in the government of his realm." It would seem that he was also fond of money, which indeed was very necessary to the carrying out of his pursuits. It is difficult to estimate justly the position of a king of such a temperament in such circ.u.mstances, whether he is to be blamed for abandoning the national policy and tradition, or whether he was not rather conscientiously trying to carry out his stewardry of his kingdom in a better way when he withheld his countenance from the perpetual wars of the Border, and addressed himself to the construction of n.o.ble halls and chapels and the patronage of the arts. He was at least so far in advance of his time, still concerned with the rudest interests of practical life as to be universally misunderstood: and he had the further misfortune of sharing the unpopularity of the favourites with whom he surrounded himself, as almost every monarch has done who has promoted men of inferior position to the high places of the State.

James's supineness, over-refinement, and love of peaceful occupations were made the more remarkable from the contrast with two manly and chivalrous brothers, the Dukes of Mar and Albany, of fine person and energetic tastes, interested in all the operations of war, fond of fine horses and gallant doings, and coming up to all the popular expectations of what was becoming in a prince. Nothing is more difficult to make out at any time than the real motives and meaning of family discords: and this is still more the case in an age not yet enlightened by the clear light of history. The chroniclers, especially Boece, have much doubt thrown upon them by more serious historians, who quote them and build upon them nevertheless, having really no better evidence to go upon. The report of these witnesses is that James had been warned by witches, in whom he believed, and by one Andrew the Fleming, an astrologer, that his chief danger arose from his own family, and that "the lion should be devoured by his whelps." Pitscottie's account, however, indicates a conspiracy between Cochrane and the Homes, whom Albany had mortally offended, as the cause at once of these prophecies and the King's alarm.

The only thing clear is that he was afraid of his brothers, and considered their existence a danger to his life. It would appear that he had already begun to surround himself with those favourites to whom was attributed every evil thing in his reign, when this poison was first instilled into his mind: and the blame was attributed rightly or wrongly to Cochrane, the chief of his "minions," who very probably felt it to be to his interest to detach from James's side the manly and gallant brothers who were naturally his nearest counsellors and champions.

There is very little that is authentic known of the men whom James III thus elevated to the steps of his throne. Cochrane was an architect probably, though called a mason in his earlier career, and had no doubt been employed on some of the buildings in which the King delighted, being "verrie ingenious" and "cunning in that craft." Perhaps, however, to make the royal favour for a mere craftsman more respectable, according to the notions of the time, it is added in a popular story that the favourite was a man of great strength and stature, whose prowess in some brawl attracted the admiration of the timid monarch, to whom a man who was a tall fellow of his hands, as well as a person of similar tastes to himself, might well be a special object of approval. A musician, William Roger, an Englishman, whose voice had charmed the King--a weakness which at least was not ign.o.ble, and was shared by various other members of his race--was the second of James's favourites: and there were others still less important--one the King's tailor--a band of persons of no condition, who surrounded him no doubt with flattery and adulation, since their promotion and maintenance were entirely dependent on his pleasure. King Louis XI was at that time upon the throne of France, a powerful prince whose little privy council was composed of equally mean men, and perhaps some reflection from the Court of the old ally of Scotland made young James believe that this was the best and wisest thing for a King to do. Louis was also a believer in astrologers, witches, and all the prophecies and omens in which they dealt. To copy him was not a high ambition, but he was in his way a great king, and it is conceivable that the feeble monarch of Scotland, never roused to the height of his father's or grandfather's example, took a little satisfaction in copying what he could from Louis. The example of Oliver le Dain might make him think that he showed his superiority by preferring his tailor, a man devoted to his service, to Albany or Angus. And if Louis trembled at the predictions of his Eastern sage, what more natural than that James should quake when the stars revealed a danger which every spaewife confirmed? No doubt he would know well the story of the mysterious spaewife who, had her advice been taken, might have saved James I. from his murderers. It is rarely that there is not a certain cruelty involved in selfish cowardice. In a sudden panic the mildest-seeming creature will trample down furiously any weaker being who stands in the way of his own safety, and James was ready for any atrocity when he was convinced that his brothers were a danger to his life and crown. The youngest, the handsome and gallant Mar, was killed by one treachery or another; and Alexander of Albany, the inheritor of that ill-omened t.i.tle, was laid up in prison to be safe out of his brother's way.

We find ourselves entirely in the regions of romance in this unfortunate reign. Sir Walter Scott has painted for us the uncomfortable Court of Louis with his barber and his prophet, and Dumas has reproduced almost the identical story in his _Vingt Ans Apres_, of the Duke of Albany's escape from Edinburgh. There could scarcely be a more curious scene.

Strangely enough James himself was resident in the castle when his brother was a prisoner there. One would have thought that so near a neighbourhood would have seemed dangerous to the alarmed monarch, but perhaps he thought, on the other hand, that watch and ward would be kept more effectually under his own eyes. Mar had died in the Canongate, perhaps in the Tolbooth there, according to tradition in a bath, where he was bled to death, probably in order that a pretence of illness or accident might be alleged; and Edinburgh, no doubt, was full of dark whispers of this strange end of one prince, and the danger of the other, shut up within the castle walls where the King's minions had full sway, and any night might witness a second dark deed. Prince Alexander's friends must have been busy and eager without, while he was not so strictly under bar and bolt inside that he could not make merry with the castle officials now and then, and cheat an evening with pleasant talk and a gla.s.s of good wine with a young captain of the guard. One day there came to him an intimation of the arrival of a ship at Leith with wine from France, accompanied by some private token that there was more in this announcement than met the ear. Albany accordingly sent a trusted servant to order two flasks of the wine, in one of which, contained in a tube of wax, was enclosed a letter, in the other a rope by which to descend the castle walls. The whole story is exactly as Dumas tells the escape of the Duc de Beaufort, though whether the romancer could have seen the old records of Scotland, or if his legend is sanctioned by the authentic history of France, I am unable to tell. Alexander, like the prince in the novel, invited the Captain of the Guard to sup with him to try the new wine--an invitation gladly accepted. After supper the Captain "pa.s.sed to the King's chamber to see what was doing, who was then lodged in the castle," probably to get the word for the night. It is curious to think of the unconscious officer, so little aware of what was about to befall, going from the chamber of the captive to that of the King, where the little Court would be a.s.sembled at their music or their "tables," or where perhaps James was taking counsel over the leaf.a.ge of a capital or the spring of an arch--and thence returning when all the rounds were made, the great gates barred and bolted, the sentries set, to the Prince in his prison, who was a finer companion still. Alexander plied the unsuspecting Captain with his wine, spiced or perhaps drugged to make it act the sooner, and along with him a warder or two who were in constant attendance upon the royal prisoner. A prince to drink with such carles! "The fire was hett, and the wyne was strong": and the united influence of the spiced drink and the hot room soon overcame the revellers, all but Alexander and his trusty man, who had taken care to refrain. In Dumas the gaoler was but gagged and bound: but in Scotland life went for little, and some of the authorities say that when the Prince saw the drunkards in his power, "he lap from the board and strak the captane with ane whinger and slew him, and also stiked other two with his own hand." He had been informed that he was to die the next day if he did not escape that night, which was some excuse for him.[2] When the men were thus disposed of, in one way or another, the Prince and his servant, "his chamber chyld," stole out with the rope to "a quiet place" on the wall. Coming out into the dark freshness and stillness of the night after that stifling and horrible room, seeing the stars once more and the distant glimmer of the sea, and feeling freedom at hand, it was little they would reck of the gaolers, always an obnoxious cla.s.s. One would imagine that it must have been on the most precipitous side of the castle rock where there were few sentinels and the exit was easy, though the descent terrible. The faithful servant tried the rope first but found it too short, and fell, breaking his thigh. With what feelings Alexander must have stolen back to get his sheets with which to lengthen the rope, pushing through the smoke, almost despairing to get off in safety! One is relieved to hear that he took his crippled attendant on his back and carried him, some say to a safe place--or, as others say, all the way across country to where the ship rocked at the pier of Leith. They must have got down to some dark spot on the northern slopes, where there would be no city watchman or late pa.s.ser-by to give the alarm, and all would be clear and still before them to the water's edge--though a long, weary, and darkling way.

[2] Buchanan's account is not so bloodthirsty: he represents Alexander as entertaining his guests with stories of his restoration to favour, and approaching deliverance, and dismissing them in all mirth and friendliness though heavy with wine: so that his guards having incontinently fallen asleep at their posts he was able to make his escape.

"But on the morne when the watchman perceived that the towis were hinging over the walls, then ran they to seek the Captane to show him the matter and manner, but he was not in his own chamber. Then they pa.s.sed to the Duke's chamber and found the door open and ane dead man lying in the chamber door and the captane and the rest burning in the fire, which was very dollorous to them; and when they missed the Duke of Albanie and his chamber chyld, they ran speedilie and shewed the King how the matter had happened. But he would not give it credence till he pa.s.sed himself and saw the matter."

These events happened in 1479, when Albany escaped to France, where he remained for some years. Up to this period all that is said of him has been favourable. His treatment by his brother was undeserved, and there is no sign of either treachery or rebellion in him in these early years.

But when he had languished for a long time in France perhaps, notwithstanding a first favourable reception, sooner or later eating the exile's bitter bread--exasperation and despair must have so wrought in him that he began to traffic with the "auld enemy" of England, and even put his hand to a base treaty, by which his brother was to be dethroned and he himself succeed to the kingdom by grace of the English king--a stipulation which Albany must have well known would d.a.m.n him for ever with his countrymen.

In the meantime James had begun to breathe again in the relief he felt to be freed of the presence of both his brothers. He "pa.s.sed through all Scotland at his pleasure, in peace and rest," says the chronicler. But it was not long that a king of Scotland could be left in this repose.

The usual trouble on the Borders had begun again as soon as Edward IV was secure upon his throne, and the English king had even sent his ships as far as the Firth of Forth, where he burnt villages and spoiled the coast under the very eyes of James. Though he would so much rather have been left in quiet to complete his beautiful new buildings at Stirling and arrange the choir in his new chapel, where there was a double supply of musicians that the King might never want this pleasure, yet the sufferings of the people and the angry impulse of the discontented n.o.bles were more than James could resist, and he set forth reluctantly towards the Border to declare war. He had become more and more shut up within his little circle of favourites after the death and disappearance of his brothers, and Cochrane had gradually acquired a more and more complete sway over the mind of his master and the affairs of the realm.

The favourite had been guilty of all those extravagances which const.i.tute the Nemesis of upstarts. He had trafficked in patronage and promotion, he had debased the currency, and he was supposed to influence the King to everything least honourable and advantageous to the country.

Last injury of all, he had either asked from the King or accepted from him--at least, permitted himself to be tricked out in the name of Mar, the t.i.tle of the young prince whose death he was believed to have brought about. The lords of Scotland had already remonstrated with the King on various occasions as to the unworthy favourites who usurped their place around his throne: and their exasperation seems to have risen to a height beyond bearing when they found "the mason," as Cochrane is called, with his new liveries and extravagance of personal finery, at the head of the army which was raised to avenge the English invasion, and in the closest confidence of the King. When they had got as far as Lauder the great lords, who were left out of all James's private councils, a.s.sembled in a council of their own in the parish church to talk over their grievances, and to consult what could be done to reform this intolerable abuse and to bring back the King to the right way. Some, it would appear, went so far as to meditate deposition, declaring that James was no longer fit to be their King, having renounced their counsel and advice, banished one brother and slain another, and "maid up fallowes, maissones, to be lords and earls in the place of n.o.blemen." The result of the meeting, however, was that milder counsels prevailed so far as James was concerned: "They concluded that the King should be taine softlie without harm of his bodie, and conveyed to the Castle of Edinburgh with certain gentlemen," while Cochrane and the rest were seized and hanged over Lauder Brig.

The question, however, remained, Who should be so bold as to take the first step and lay hands upon the favourite? It was now that Lord Gray, one of the conspirators, told, with that humour which comes in so grimly in many dark historic scenes, the story of the mice and the cat--how the mice conspired to save themselves by attaching a bell to the cat to warn them of her movements--until the terrible question arose which among them should attach to the neck of the enemy this instrument of safety.

One can imagine the grave barons with half a smile looking at each other consciously, in acknowledgment of a risk which it needed a brave man to run. Angus, the head of the existing branch of the Douglas family, who had already risen into much of the power and importance of his forfeited kinsman, answered with equally grim brevity "I'se bell the cat." But while he spoke, the general enemy, mad with arrogance and self-confidence, and not believing in any power or boldness which could stop him in his career, forestalled the necessity. He came to the kirk, where no doubt he had heard there was some unauthorised a.s.sembly, arrayed in black velvet with bands of white, the livery he had chosen, a great gold chain round his neck, a hunting horn slung about him adorned with gold and jewels, and probably a marvel of mediaeval art--and "rushed rudlie at the kirk door." The hum of fierce satisfaction which arose when the keeper of the door challenged the applicant for admission, and the answer, "The Earl of Mar," rang into the silence in which each man had been holding his breath, may be imagined. It was Archibald Bell-the-Cat, ever hereafter known by that name, who advanced to meet the swaggering intruder in all his pride of privilege and place, but with a welcome very different from that which the favourite expected, who had come, no doubt, to break up the whisperings of the conspirators and a.s.sert his own authority. Angus pulled the gold chain from Cochrane's neck, and said "a rop would sett him better," while another Douglas standing by s.n.a.t.c.hed at the horn. Cochrane, astonished but not yet convinced that any real opposition was intended, asked between offence and alarm, perhaps beginning to doubt the sombre excited a.s.sembly, "My lords, is it jest or earnest?" It would seem that the grim and terrible event of the execution "over the Bridge of Lauder" though why this special locality was chosen we are not told, followed with an awful rapidity. The chief offender had fallen into the hands of the conspirators with such unhoped-for ease that they evidently felt no time was to be lost.

"Notwithstanding the lords held him quiet while they caused certain armed men pa.s.s to the King's pavilion, and two or three wyse men with them, and gave the King fair and pleasant words, till they had laid hands on all his servants, and took them and hanged them over the Bridge of Lauder before the King's eyes, and brought in the King himself to the council. Thereafter incontinent they brought out Cochrane and his hands bound with ane tow, behind his back, who desired them to take ane of his own pavilion tows [cords] which were of silk and bind his hands, for he thought shame to be bound with ane hemp tow lyk ane thiefe. The lords answered and said, 'He was worse than a thiefe, he was ane traitour and deserved no better.'"

The last despairing bravado of the condemned man desiring that his hands might be bound with a silken cord at least, the horror and wrath of the pale King, helpless, looking on, forced into the a.s.sembly of the lords to witness their pitiless vengeance, are painfully tragical and terrible. All James's favourite attendants, the friends of his retired leisure and sharers in the occupations he loved, were thus executed before his eyes--all but a certain young Ramsay, who was at least a gentleman, and who, to save his life, leapt up behind his master upon the horse which the King was compelled to mount to see the dreadful deed accomplished. Ramsay's life was spared, not to the advantage of Scotland as became afterwards apparent.

The historical student will not fail to note how close in almost every particular is this grim incident to the catastrophe of Piers Gaveston in England in a previous age.

The state of affairs in Scotland after this extraordinary event was more extraordinary still, if possible. James was conveyed to Edinburgh,

"with certain lords in companie with him that took hold on him and keeped him in the said castle and served and honoured him as ane prince ought to be in all things: for he was not put there as a prisoner, but for the maintaining of the commonweill: gave him leave to use all his directions, gifts, and casualties at his pleasure.

For nothing was derogat from him by reason of his authority, and all letters was given and proclamations made and printed in his name lykas they were before at his inputting, nor no regent nor governour was chosen at that time, but every lord within his own bounds was sworn to minister justice and to punish theft and slaughter within themselves, or else to bring the doers of the same to the King's justice at Edinburgh."

"Thus there was peace and rest in the country the s.p.a.ce of three-quarters of a year," says Pitscottie. This, however, is a mistake, for the time of the King's retirement was only three or four months, from St. Magdalene's Day to Michaelmas. Short or long, it was one of the most curious moments of interregnum that history knows. James was conveyed back to Edinburgh with every show of respect, attended by the triumphant lords, who despised his milder virtues, his preferences and tastes, not one of whom could manage either pencil or lute, who cared for none of these things--while his strained eyes could still see nothing but the vision against the daylight, the impromptu gibbet of the high-arched bridge over the Border stream, where his familiar friends had been strung up with every sign of infamy. He had to contain within himself the rage, the shame, the grief and loneliness of his heart, and endure as he best could the exultation which his captors would scarcely attempt to conceal. The historians tell us little or nothing of the Queen, Margaret of Denmark, to whom James had been married for several years, and who had brought with her the full allegiance of the isles, the Hebrides, which up to that time had paid a tribute to the Scandinavian kingdom, and Orkney and Shetland which were the Queen's portion. Whether he found any comfort in her and in his children, when he was thus brought back to them to the castle, which would seem to have been their favourite residence, we are not told. At all events the shame of such a return, and of the captivity which was veiled by so many ironical appearances of freedom, must have been grievous to him, even as reflected in the eyes of his foreign wife, or the wondering questions on his sudden return of his baby son.

How this strange state of things was brought to an end it is difficult to tell, for the story is confused and troublesome. According to Pitscottie, James's private friends advised him first to take counsel with the Earl of Douglas, the long-forfeited and banished Earl, represented as being then imprisoned in Edinburgh, which is clearly apocryphal: and afterwards with the Duke of Albany, to whom Pitscottie is throughout very favourable, making no mention of his undoubted treachery. For whatever may be the actual truth of all the curious and confused movements that were going on, it appears to be beyond doubt that Albany--though he had lately visited the English Court and formed a treasonable bargain with Edward IV to dethrone James, and to be himself made King in dependence upon England--now acted like a true brother.

His first use of his alliance with Edward seems to have been for the advantage of the sovereign whom he intended to displace, a curious paradox of which we can offer no explanation. In this magnanimous act he had the support of the English who had engaged to help him, as the doc.u.ments prove, in so different an enterprise: all which is very bewildering. Accompanied by the Duke of Gloucester and a small army, he suddenly appeared in Edinburgh to deliver the royal prisoner. There would seem to have been no fighting of any kind, nor any attempt on the part of Albany to dethrone his brother--nothing, indeed, but what would appear the most magnanimous action on his part, were not those secret treaties in existence bearing a silent testimony against him. When the lords heard of the coming of this expedition, which occurred in August 1482 (Albany having escaped in 1479, three years before), they "drew themselves together to ane council," apparently to watch the proceedings of the invaders.

"Soon therafter compeired the Duke of Albanie and the Duke of Gloucester within the town of Edinburgh, with the number of ane thousand gentlemen, and entered within the Tolbooth thereof before the lords of Scotland, who were sitting at ane council at that time, and there very reverently saluted the Duke of Albanie, reverenced him and welcomed him home, and required of him what was his pet.i.tion. He answered, 'I desire the King's grace, my brother, to be put to libertie,' which was granted to him incontinent. But the Chancellor answered and said, 'My lord, we will grant you your desires; but as to that man that is with you, we know him not, nor yet will we grant nothing to his desire.'"

This speech, which breathes that undying defiance of English interference which was the very inspiration of Scotland, is too characteristic not to be genuine. "That man" was Richard, afterwards Richard III, "Crookback Richard," the bitter and powerful hunchback of Shakespeare, whom other authorities have endeavoured in vain to persuade us to regard in a more favourable light. Whatever he might be in other aspects, in Scotland he was merely Albany's companion, silently aiding in what seems a most legitimate and honourable mission. The only way the historians can find of reconciling this strangely virtuous and exemplary behaviour with the secret engagements between Albany and England is by the conjecture that the lords of Scotland were so evidently indisposed to favour Albany, and there was so little feeling shown towards him by any part of the population, that the treason was silently abandoned, and in the hopelessness of playing a treasonable part he played a magnanimous one, with the utmost grace and semblance of sincerity; which is a bewildering conclusion. In any case he was the deliverer of his brother. It would seem to be the fact, however, that James's deliverance was much aided by the att.i.tude of the burghers of Edinburgh, who were, as so often, on the King's side--and to whom the character of a patron of the arts, and promoter of so many persons of their own cla.s.s into his friendship, would naturally be as great a recommendation as it was an offence to the others. Their action at this period excited the King's grat.i.tude so much that he conferred upon the city a special charter, securing the independence of their munic.i.p.al government, as well as their right to levy customs in the port of Leith, and also, it is said, a sign of these privileges, in the shape of the standard called the Blue Blanket, which still remains in the possession of the Edinburgh guilds, with liberty to display it for their king, country, and city rights, when occasion calls.

The two Dukes of Albany and Gloucester marched together to the castle, preceded by heralds, to claim the King from the officials who had him in charge. One can imagine the mingled relief and humiliation of James when delivered from that stronghold by the brother who had escaped from it by night, within a few hours of the time when he had been ordered for execution, and who in the meantime had been an exile. There is no reason to suppose that he was aware of the secret understanding with England to which his brother had set his seal, so that there was nothing to lessen the intensity of the coals of fire thus heaped upon his head. No doubt all Edinburgh was in the streets to watch that strange sight, as the King rode from the castle gates, past the great Church of St. Giles, and down the long line of the Canongate to Holyrood, making his emanc.i.p.ation visible to all. Apparently he had not left the castle since he was brought into it in shame and misery after the fatal episode at Lauder.

One wonders how he looked upon the crowd which no doubt would throng after him with acclamations--whether thankfully and cheerfully in the pleasure of release, or with a revengeful sense of how little he owed to their easy applauses. It is said that Albany rode behind him on the same horse as an exhibition of amity. It is very probable that James would find bitterness in that too, as another humiliation.

The King was no sooner free than he made it evident that he had not forgiven the humiliation and shame to which he had been subjected. He imprisoned in their turn a number of the lords who had been foremost in the death of Cochrane, and would have "justified" them we are told, but for the interference of Angus--now too great apparently for James to touch--and Albany. For some time after the latter remained with his brother, fulfilling the functions of chief counsellor and Prime Minister. But whether he displayed his ambition and evil intentions, or the old jealousy and terrors of James got the upper hand as the lords again became suspicious of him, it is difficult to tell. At all events Albany was forced to escape once more for his life, and again took refuge in France, where either now or previously, for the chronology is difficult to follow, he had made a great marriage. Here he disappears altogether from Scottish history, and not long after from life, having been killed by accident in a tournament. Had Albany been the elder instead of the younger brother it seems very probable that a dark chapter might have been left out of the history of Scotland, and a third patriotic and energetic King carried on the traditions of the first and second James.

But it was scarcely to be looked for that, after all the dissensions between the King and the lords, everything should settle into harmony again. James is said to have removed to Stirling from Edinburgh, which no doubt had acquired painful a.s.sociations to him from the time of his enforced residence there--and to have resumed or completed the buildings in which he had taken so much pleasure--especially the great hall of Stirling Castle, with all its grotesque and curious ornamentation, which seems to prove that Scotland was still much behind in refinement, though with a barbaric inspiration of her own. Whether the renewed tumults began by the appropriation of certain Church lands. .h.i.therto in the power of the Homes, for the endowment of the King's new chapel, it is difficult to tell, a similar reason having been already alleged for disturbances in which the Duke of Albany was the antagonist of that powerful family; at all events a very small matter was enough to awake again all the old rancours. The malcontents headed by the same men who had already inflicted so much suffering and shame upon the King began to draw together in alarming numbers. Roused from among his more congenial occupations by this renewed commotion, James sent a herald to ask the reason of their a.s.sembling: but the herald was disrespectfully treated and his letters torn in pieces, an insult which seems to have convinced the King that the strongest measures of defence were necessary. He is said to have strongly fortified Stirling, where Prince James, the heir of the kingdom, now a boy of fifteen or sixteen, was. Perhaps the King was suspicious of the boy, perhaps his old terrors as to the danger to his life which was to arise from his own family had returned to him: for the restrictions under which young James was left were exceedingly severe and arbitrary. No man was to be allowed to enter the castle, great or small, till the King's return, nor was the Prince to be allowed to pa.s.s the gates "to no game, nor to meet with no man." Pitscottie says that Edinburgh Castle was also strengthened, and the King's treasury placed in it and all his valuables laid up there. When these precautions were taken James embarked "in ane ship of Captane Woode's"--probably the most legitimate way in which he could have travelled, the vessel being that of the Admiral, Andrew Wood, the greatest sailor in Scotland--and went to Fife, from whence he marched to the north, calling the n.o.bles of the northern counties round him, and gathering an army with which to oppose the greater lords and lairds who awaited him on the other side of the Firth of Forth. James's unusual energy must have equally roused and alarmed the rebels, against whom the royal name was as a strong tower.

That such men as Angus and the other great n.o.bles of Scotland, who had reduced their King to a puppet with such entire success, should now feel it necessary to get possession of Prince James in order to confer dignity, on their proceedings seems very strange; but perhaps when rebellion comes to the dignity of a pitched battle its flags and pretensions are of more importance than when it can so order matters as to put on an appearance of acting in the King's own interests, as at Lauder. And how far the Prince might be an independent actor in this troubled drama there is no evidence to show. He had arrived at an age when youths in these early-maturing days acted for themselves; even in our own a lad of sixteen would scarcely allow his name to be employed against his father without some protest, and could not be treated as a child in a conflict so momentous. Therefore it is scarcely possible to imagine that the Prince was entirely guiltless. And the spectator cannot but enter with warmth into the feelings of the King when he discovered what had been done, and that his heir was in the enemy's camp, giving substance and reason to their rebellion.