of the realm, and being then presented to the people, who were asked by the archbishop if they were willing to accept him and obey him as their liege lord, the order of the oath and the presentation was reversed—the former not being administered till after the king had been shown by the archbishop, whose address to the people also, as Burnet has observed, was couched "in such terms as should demonstrate he was no elective prince; for he, being declared the rightful and undoubted heir, both by the laws of God and man, they were desired to give their good-wills and assents to the same, as by their duty of allegiance they were bound to do." As usual, a general pardon for state offenders was proclaimed, from which, however, were excepted, along with a few other names, those of the Duke of Norfolk and Cardinal Pole. The "Good Duke," with all his eminence of station and sounding titles, was far from being yet satisfied with the position he had attained. So long as the chancellor continued a member of the council, Somerset must have felt that his exercise of supreme power would be subject to a constant check; and the crafty Southampton (Wriothesley), on the other hand, seems to have been by no means thrown into despair, or any thought of abandoning his post, by his discomfiture in their first trial of strength. In fact, it may be said to have been the eagerness with which he allowed himself to be carried away and absorbed by his political functions, that brought about his ruin. "Resolving," as Burnet says, "to give himself wholly to matters of state," in order that he might have time to attend the daily meetings of the council, on the 18th of February, without consulting his colleagues in the government, he put the great seal to a commission in the king's name, empowering four masters of his court, or any two of them, to hear all manner of causes in his absence, and giving to their decrees the same force as if they had been pronounced by himself, on condition only that they should be signed by him before their enrolment. This act of imprudence was immediately pounced upon by the opposite party; the subject was referred to the judges, who declared that the chancellor had committed an offence against the king which was punishable at common law with the loss of office, and fine and imprisonment at the royal pleasure. Southampton, after an attempt to maintain the legality of the commission, offered to submit to have it revoked, if it were deemed illegal; but these terms of accommodation were of course rejected; and, at last, on the 6th of March, the council resolved that the great seal should be taken from him, and that he should, in the meantime, be confined to his residence at Ely House, and be fined as should be afterwards thought fitting. He remained a prisoner in his own house for nearly four months, and was only then discharged after he had entered into a recognizance of £4000, to pay whatever fine should be imposed upon him. "Thus fell the lord-chancellor," says Burnet; "and in him the Popish party lost their chief support, and the protector his most emulous rival." Burnet acknowledges that the proceedings against him were summary and severe, beyond the usage of the privy council, and without the common forms of legal processes." 66 The next measure of the protector was to take into his own hands the entire power of the executive government. A week after the ejection of Southampton, by a commission running in the king's name, and signed by himself and his friends Cranmer, St. John, Russell, Northampton, Cheyney, Paget, and Brown, the duke was declared governor of the king and protector of the kingdom, without any participation on the part of the council, which was indeed dissolved, by the members being united in a new council with the twelve persons who had been appointed to be their advisers by Henry's will, and the whole being now constituted a mere council of advice, the protector being at the same time empowered to add to their numbers to any extent he pleased. In other words, Somerset was invested with the whole of the royal authority, and, in everything save the name, made King of England. The frame of the government at home being thus settled, the attention of the protector was immediately called to foreign affairs. The treaty of Campes (7th June, 1546), had, as already related, both established peace with France and suspended active hostilities with the Scots, although Henry had continued to keep up a secret intercourse with the Protestants in Scotland, as the party opposed to the government of the Earl of Arran, and had, after the murder of Cardinal Beaton, openly sent supplies to the authors of that atrocity, whom Arran was in vain endeavouring to dislodge from the castle of St. Andrews. Henry, on his death-bed, is said to have enjoined the lords of his council that they should leave nothing undone to bring about the marriage between his son and the infant Queen of Scots, on which he had so strongly set his heart; and his desire no doubt was that they should pursue that object, as he himself would have done had he lived, either, as opportunity and circumstances might seem to invite, by negotiation and intrigue, or by a rougher wooing." Somerset, accordingly, now addressed a letter to the Scottish nobility, strongly urging upon them the policy as well as the obligation of fulfilling "the promises, seals, and oaths, which, by public 66 authority, had passed for concluding this mar- | five months before this fortress, had made a truce riage." This appeal, however, produced little Both countries were already making preparations for a war on a greater scale, when an event happened that materially affected their position towards each other. Francis I. died at Rambouillet on the 31st March; thus surviving by little more than two months the King of England, with whom he had been so constantly connected, either with the garrison in February: and when the French galleys arrived, in the end of June, he was engaged on a plundering expedition beyond REMAINS OF THE CASTLE OF ST. ANDREWS.-From a drawing by J. Oliphant. as a friend or an enemy, for more than thirty | the western marches, from which, however, he years. Since the accession of Edward, however, arrangements had been made for having the late alliance between the two crowns renewed; and the treaty had, in fact, been concluded at London, and wanted only to be formally ratified by Francis at the time of his death. That heaviest blow, as it was considered at the moment, that could have befallen the Protestant cause on the Continent, enabling the emperor, as it did, to carry everything before him for a time both in Germany and in Italy, soon appeared likely to be no less disastrous to the same interest in Scotland. Henry II., the son and successor of Francis, preserved for a little while a show of amicable intercourse with England; but it was sufficiently evident from the first what course he was about to take. Under the control of the Duke of Guise and the Cardinal of Lorraine, the brothers of the queen-dowager of Scotland, who now, along with Arran, stood at the head of the Catholic party and of the established government in that country, the politics of the new King of France immediately evinced a complete return to the old system of a close alliance with the Scots, as affording the most effective means of annoying and embarrassing England. When the treaty of London was presented to Henry II., he refused to sign it; and soon after he openly took part in the war on the side of the Scottish government by sending a fleet of sixteen galleys, under the command of Leo Strozzi, prior of Capua, to assist the regent in reducing the castle of St. Andrews. Arran, after lying for hastened home, bringing with him, according to John Knox, who had joined Norman Lesly and | Cockburnspath, the invaders began the work of his companions after the truce made with Arran war by sitting down before Douglas Castle, a in the preceding February. The castle of St. hold belonging to Sir George Douglas. The capAndrews was demolished by order of the Scot-tain, Matthew Hume, the son of a brother of tish privy council. It has ever since remained a Lord Hume, made no vain show of resistance, ruin. The English protector had been for some time busy collecting an army for the invasion of Scotland; and by the end of August he was ready to set out for the north at the head of a well-appointed force, which appears to have amounted to above 20,000 men, of whom 6000 were cavalry; a fleet of sixty-five vessels, of which thirty-five were ships of war, and the remainder laden with ammunition and victuals, being equipped to accompany the expedition, under the command of the Lord Clinton. A journal of this invasion of Scotland is extant, written by a person who served in the protector's army, which is not only one of the most minutely curious records of that age, but one of the most vivid pictures of the realities of war ever drawn.' The author, W. Patten, was conjoint judge-marshal of the army along with the afterwards celebrated William Cecil, and his work is dedicated to Paget, whom he styles "his most benign fautor and patron." He is, of course, a professed worshipper of his grace of Somerset, upon whom he heaps his laudation throughout with unbounded prodigality. Yet, allowance being made for some courtly embellishment, he evidently, in the main, sets down what he saw with his own eyes, and he tells his story with a hearty gossiping relish that of itself betokens a keen and quick-sighted observer. but soon came forth, "and brought with him," says our journalist, "his band to my lord's grace, which was of twenty-one sober (poor) soldiers, all so apparelled and appointed that, so God help me (I will say it for no praise), I never saw such a bunch of beggars come out of one house together in my life." Six of the most decent of these scarecrows were detained; the rest were allowed "to gea their gate,"—that is, to go their way,with an admonition that they would be hanged the next time they were caught. The castle was afterwards blown up with gunpowder, as were also Thornton and Anderwick, two other peels or strongholds belonging to Lord Hume. The invading force continued its march close to the German Ocean, and, passing within gunshot of Dunbar, encamped for the night in the neighbourhood of Tantallon Castle. Here they received the first certain intelligence of the posi tion of the enemy. The next day, Wednesday, the 7th, turning to the west, they crossed the small river Lynn, the horse taking the water, the infantry passing over by Linton bridge. A number of Scottish prickers, or horse, were now seen on a rising ground not far from Hailes Castle, belonging to Earl Bothwell, some of whom appeared to be making towards the river, with the intention probably of picking up stragglers or attacking the rear of the English cavalry, whom a sudden mist had enveloped while they were yet crossing the water. ranged that the ships of war should fall down the Frith, and take their stations opposite to the town of Musselburgh, near to which the army lay. On the evening of the same day, Friday, the 8th, the English encamped in the neighbourhood of Salt Preston, now called Prestonpans. The army having been collected at Newcastle, the protector rode thither from London, and was A communication was now established with met six miles from the town on Saturday, the the fleet, which lay over against Leith; and, the 27th of August, by Warwick, the lord-lieute-lord-admiral having come on shore, it was arnant, and Sadler, the master-treasurer. The next day a muster of the whole force was held; and on Monday, the 29th, they set forward for the Borders. Reaching Berwick on Friday, the 2d of September, they found there Lord Clinton with the fleet, which immediately put to sea, while the army rested a day, and then, on the Sunday, set forward on its march close along the shore. Having made their way, on the 5th, across the deep glen or valley of the Peaths, or the Pease (as it is commonly pronounced), at The two armies were now separated by a distance of little more than two miles, and each camp was to be seen from the high grounds in the neighbourhood of the other. Both had the sea to the north, while on the south, and about midway between them, rose, facing the west, the 1 "The Expedition into Scotland of the most worthily fortun-eminence called Falside, or Fawside Brae, the ate Prince Edward Duke of Somerset, uncle to our most noble Sovereign Lord the King's Majesty Edward the VI., Governor of his Highness' Person, and Protector of his Grace's realms, dominions, and subjects; made in the first year of his Majesty's most prosperous reign, and set out by way of Diary. By W. Patten, Londoner." This narrative, which was first published at London in 1548, was reprinted in (Dalyell's) Fragments of Scottish History, 4to, Edin. 1798, of which work, however, the whole impression amounted to only 200 copies. Patten's Diary, therefore, is still a tract. of great rarity. termination of an inconsiderable range of hills extending in a direction parallel to the sea. Upon this elevation, which was surmounted by "a sorry castle, and half a score houses of like worthiness by it," all the morning of Saturday, the 9th, the Scottish horsemen were seen "pranking" up and down; but in the afternoon a party persons were slain and taken prisoners on both sides; among others, the son and heir of Lord Hume fell into the hands of the English, and that lord himself, though he escaped, was severely hurt, and put hors de combat by a fall from his horse. After this affair, Somerset, Warwick, and others of the captains, attended by a guard of 300 horse, proceeded to the hill to take a view of the Scottish camp. There, on the lower ground between them and the declining sun, glittered the white tents of Arran's numerous host, disposed in four long rows running from east to west, and about an arrow-shot asunder, "not unlike to four great ridges of ripe barley." Ripe, indeed, it might have been added, was the living harvest for the sickle! The position of the Scots, however, was a very strong one: the sea, as already mentioned, skirted them to the north; a great marsh covered their opposite or right flank; while their front was strongly defended by the river Esk flowing northward into the sea, with no great volume of water, indeed, but yet with banks so steep and rugged as almost to defy the approach of an enemy. The ancient bridge over this river they had taken possession of and "kept well warded with ordnance;" it stood within twelve score paces of the sea; and in front of the bridge, on the narrow space of ground between it and the sea, they had also planted two field-pieces, and stationed some hackbatters or musketeers, under a turf wall. Be tween Fawside Brae and the Esk stood another augh! Tranent latter brought a personal challenge from his master, the Lord Huntly, to Somerset, whom the Scottish earl asked to fight him, either singly, or with ten or twenty more on each side, and so to decide the contest Haddington Without further effusion of Awside Elphinstone Elphinstone Stonshires blood. The protector, as might have been, and no doubt was expected, declined both propositions. It was now resolved to occupy the hill on which stood St. Michael's Church, and for that purpose, on the following morning, that of Saturday, the 10th -long popularly remembered in Scotland as the Black Saturday-the army was put in motion by eight o'clock. Upon coming in sight of the ground, they were greatly amazed to find that the Scots had crossed the river, and were there before them; for that Arran would have quitted the Bellyford English Miles. advantageous position he held, and have thus left all his strong natural defences behind his 1 Figure No. 1 represents a hackbut. No. 2, an enlarged fig ure of the lock of a hack but, in which A is the pan to contain the priming; B, slide or shield to cover the priming, mounted with checks to prevent its incidental return; C, thumb-holes, which being pressed at the time of pulling the trigger (see Nos. 1 and 3), uncovered the pan by means of a spring, D; E, fork to hold the quick match, F, screw for compressing the sides of the fork upon the match; G, G, the sight; H, guide, moveable along the barrel. No. 3 is a petronel-a firearm of similar con trivance; the stock contains a box for holding the charges, which had been secured by a slide. This weapon, which be little insulated eminence, crowned by the parish longed to Henry VIII., is of beautiful construction, and ornachurch of St. Michael's of Inveresk. A heraldmented with great elegance. It bears the royal arms, and the initials H. R. back, was the last thought that could have entered their heads. It should appear, however, that the Scots were afraid of their invaders escaping them, and that their intention was, if they had not been thus encountered in the intermediate space, to have attacked Somerset in his camp. When they saw the English approaching, they advanced at a round pace; but their course was immediately checked by a discharge of artillery from the admiral's galley, which was so effective as to kill between twenty and thirty of them, their line of march, in consequence of the situation of the bridge by which they had passed over, being close upon the sea. This slaughter, Patten affirms, so scared a body of 4000 Irish (that is, Highland) archers brought by the Earl of Argyle, "that whereas, it was said, they should have been a wing to the fore- | ward (vanguard), they could never after be made to come forward.” The whole advancing host now moved away to the right, with the object of gaining Fawside Brae; but here the English were before them, and succeeded not only in occupying the brow of the hill, but in planting several field-pieces upon its summit, so as to fire over the heads of the men below. For this they were indebted principally to their great superiority in cavalry. As for the Scots, Patten notices it as a remarkable circumstance, that "in all this enterprise they used for haste so little the help of horse, that they plucked forth their ordnance by draught of men." When they saw the English in possession of the hill-side, the Scots suddenly stopped, in a fallow field, where a great ditch or slough still divided them from the enemy. Undeterred by this obstacle, however, the Lord Gray proceeded to attack them, and, though many of his men stuck in the slough, and they were also impeded by the cross ridges of the ploughed field, he dashed on and made his way up to the Scots, who stood still to receive the attack, only when their assailants were near upon them, "striking their pike points, and crying 'Come here, louns (rascals), come here, tykes (dogs), come here, heretics,' and such like." It is affirmed that the left wing of the Scots was at first compelled to give way; but this seems to have been only for a moment; the English soon turned round in a body to regain the hill. The flight, in fact, seems to have been general, in so far as the common troopers were concerned; the gentlemen alone for a few moments tried to make a stand; in the vain attempt no fewer than twenty-six of them were slain; Lord Gray himself was severely wounded in the mouth; and the Scots rushing up to the royal standard actually got hold of it, and in the struggle succeeded in carrying away a part of the staff. Patten's description of what he calls "the countenance of the war," up to this time, bears vivid traces of the alarm and confusion in which he and his countrymen found themselves. Another old English historian admits that "albeit encounters between horsemen on the one side and foot on the other, are seldom with the extremity of danger, because as horsemen can hardly break a battail on foot, so men on foot cannot possibly chase horsemen; yet hereupon so great was the tumult and fear among the English, that had not the commanders been men both of approved courage and skill, or haply had the Scots been well-furnished with men-at-arms, the army had that day been utterly undone."1 Warwick, in particular, exerted himself in restoring the self-possession of the men, assuring them that if they would only follow their officers, the day was still their own. It was now seen that the impetuosity of the Scots had involved an inconsiderable part of their force almost within a complete inclosure of their enemies; on which, we proceeded, says Patten, “to compass them in that they should no way escape us the which by our power and number we were as well able to do as a spinner's web to catch a swarm of bees." The requisite dispositions were forthwith made by the several officers with great skill and effect. "The master of the ordnance," continues the narrative, "to their great annoyance did gall them with hail shot and other out of the great ordnance directly from the hill-top, and certain other gunners with their pieces aflank from our rearward, most of our artillery and marine engines there wholly with great puissance and vehemency occupied thus about them. Herewith the full sight of our footmen, all shadowed from them before by our horsemen and dust raised, whom then they were ware in such order to be so near upon them. And to this the perfect array of our horsemen again coming courageously to set on them afresh." The tide and current of the "heady fight" were in a moment turned. The Scots, staggered and bewildered, first fell back, and then began to take to flight. Arran himself, their general, is said to have been the first to put spurs to his horse-after him Angus; then the Highland archers, who had never yet been engaged, fled in a body. "Therewith then turned all the whole rout, cast down their weapons, ran out of their wards, off with their jacks, and with all that ever they might, betook them to the race that their governor began. Our men had found them at the first (as what could escape so many thousand eyes), and sharply and quickly, with an universal outcry, They fly! they fly! pursued after in chase amain; and thereto so eagerly and with such fierceness, that they over 1 Hayward. |