1 ‘A man of science as well as of philosophic mind would employ himself well in examining those accounts of prodigies in the early annalists and chroniclers, which of late years have been regarded as only worthy of contempt.’—Southey—Omniana, i. 266.

2 De Fratribus Minoribus nulla est quæstio, professi siquidem simulatam paupertatem, nulla prædia, nullos fundos habent; sed sub prætextu pietatis ex interceptis testamentis, et stultæ pietatis zelo, ditissimi facti sunt: quod ex eventu, post infelicem pugnam de Flodden, compertum est: nam qui eo pugnaturi proficiscebantur, nisi confessione facta remissionem a Fratribus Minoribus impetrassent, omnia mala ominabantur. Interea omnem pecuniam, monumenta, et si quid pretiosum alioqui habebant, eorum fidei committebant, sperantes, se mortuis, illos ea quæ credebantur omnia fide integra posteris suis restituros: at illi, eorum qui in prælio occubuerunt, nec fidem reposcere poterant, bona in fundi comparatione, et ecclesiæ et monasterii exstructione ad sui ordinis homines convertebant: nec aliter accidit in acie Pinquini.—Craig, Jus Feudale, lib. i.

3 Registrum Episcopatus Aberdonensis, ii., 309, 310.

4 As often as I turn my eyes to the niceness and elegance of our own times, the ancient manners of our forefathers appear sober and venerable, but withal rough and horrid.—Buchanan: De Jure Regni, as quoted by Dugald Stewart in Preliminary Dissertation, Encyclopædia Britannica.

5 This phrase occurs in an order of the provost of Edinburgh (Earl of Arran), dated 1518, excusing Francis Bothwell from taking the part of Little John.—Napier’s Life of Napier of Merchiston, p. 53.

6 See the Rev. Joseph Hunter’s tract, The Ballad Hero Robin Hood, 1852; making it at length tolerably certain that the outlaw lived in the reign of Edward II, and for a short time held office in that king’s household.

7 Arnot’s History of Edinburgh.

8 Scots Acts, 1555.

9 Persons in the employment of the craftsmen; journeymen.

10 From a sculpture on the Magdalen Chapel, Cowgate, Edinburgh.

11 Refreshment at 4 o’clock afternoon. Latterly, the term has been applied to tea-drinking.

12 A road in the line of the present Princes Street.

13 Knox says she frowned here, and gave the books to Arther Erskine, the captain of her guard, ‘the maist pestilent papist within the realm.’

14 Anti-tune, antiphone, or response.

15 Notes to Ancient Scottish Poems from the Bannatyne Manuscript, 1770.

16 From a unique copy of this tract a reprint was given by Mr John Robertson to the Bannatyne Club, 1833.

17 See under October 1570; also April 5, 1603.

18 Comedy of Errors, Act III. sc. 2.

19 In July 1538, there is an entry in the treasurer’s books, of 14s. ‘to Alexander Naper for mending of the Queen’s sadill and her cheriot, in Sanct Androis.’ In January 1541-2, there is another: ‘To mend the Quenis cheriot vi-1/4 elnis blak velvet, £16, 17s. 6d.’ Besides something for cramosie, satin, and fringes.

20 History of the Family of Mackenzie, MS. in possession of J. W. Mackenzie, Esq., W.S., Edinburgh.

21 A tract containing the disputation was printed by Lekprivik in 1563, and has been republished, Edinburgh, George Ramsay & Co., 1812. Dr M‘Crie, in his Life of John Knox, gives an ample abstract of this curious pamphlet.

22 Randolph to Cecil, Edin. Nov. 30, 1562. Chalmers’s Life of Queen Mary.

23 Edin. Council Register, apud Maitland.

24 In England, the spring of 1562 had been marked by excessive rains, and the harvest was consequently bad. Towards the end of the year, plague broke out in the crowded and harassed population of Havre, in France, then undergoing a siege, and from the garrison it was imparted to England, which had been prepared for its reception by the famine. There it prevailed throughout the whole year 1563, carrying off 20,000 persons in London alone. ‘The poor citizens,’ says Stowe, ‘were this year plagued with a threefold plague—pestilence, dearth of money, and dearth of victuals; the misery whereof were too long here to write. No doubt the poor remember it.’ On account of the plague at Michaelmas, no term was kept, and there was no lord-mayor’s dinner! The plague spread into Germany, where it was estimated to have carried off 300,000 persons.

25 See notes to Scott’s Lay of the Last Minstrel.

26 This curious contract is printed entire in Pitcairn, iii. 390.

27 Scott’s notes, ut supra.

28 There is a place called Tarlair near Banff.

29 Nicol Burne’s Disputation, p. 143.

30 While Drury lay before the castle, Lord Fleming entered into a hostile correspondence with Sir George Carey, one of Elizabeth’s officers. This is given in Holinshed’s Chronicle.

31 Mr Pennant, from whom the above translation is borrowed, says, by a strange mistake, ‘on one of the deer.’

32 William Barclay, De Regno et Regali Potestate adversus Monarchomachos. Parisiis, 1600. This author was a native of Aberdeenshire, but finally settled at Angers, in France, as Professor of Civil Law in the University there. He died in 1604.

Bishop Geddes, in introducing this extract from Barclay’s forgotten work to the notice of the Society of the Antiquaries of Scotland (1782), remarks that a still more grand entertainment of the same kind was given in 1529 to King James V., his mother, Queen Margaret, and the pope’s legate, by the then Earl of Athole, and that an account of the affair has been preserved in Lindsay of Pitscottie’s History of Scotland. The venerable bishop adds: ‘Need I take notice that the hunting described by Barclay bears some resemblance to the batidas of the present king of Spain, where several huntsmen form a line and drive the deer through a narrow pass, at one side of which the king, with some attendants, has his post, in a green but of boughs, and slaughters the poor animals as they come out almost as fast as charged guns can be put into his hand and he fire them. These are things sufficiently known; and the same manner of stag-hunting is practised in Italy, Germany, and other parts of Europe.’421

33 Gunn’s Historical Enquiry respecting the Harp in the Highlands. 1807.

34 Agnes Strickland’s Life of Queen Mary.

35 Archæologia Scotica, ii. 287.

36 Richard Bannatyne’s Memorials, p. 238.

37 Dalyell’s Darker Superstitions of Scotland, p. 130.

38 Walter Goodall and Miss Agnes Strickland have been misled by the description of the place in Bothwell’s Act of Forfeiture—‘ad pontes, vulgo vocatos foulbriggs‘—into the belief that the queen was seized at the suburb of Edinburgh formerly called Foulbriggs, and now Fountain Bridge. In reality, the expression in the Act, rightly translated, applies to the place indicated in the Diurnal of Occurrents—‘at the Briggs, commonly called Foulbriggs,’ the syllable foul being presumably a vulgar casual addition which the ancient marshy condition of the place rendered appropriate. All the other contemporary writers place the scene of the seizure at the Almond—Buchanan, Birrel, and Herries—while Sir James Melville, who was one of the party seized, says ‘betwixt Linlithgow and Edinburgh’—an expression he could scarcely have used if the fact had happened close to the city. In Ane Chronicle of the Kings of Scotland, printed by the Maitland Club, and apparently contemporary, the brig of Awmont is the locality assigned. But the most powerful evidence on the subject, and what sets the matter at rest, is a Remission under the Privy Seal, of date October 1, 1567, to Andrew Redpath, for his being concerned in ‘besetting the queen’s way ... near the water of Awmond, and for taking and ravishing her,’ &c. It may be remarked that there is no evidence of the suburb alluded to by Miss Strickland having been called Foulbriggs, or having existed at all, at that time, while we have proof of the existence of a place on the Almond Water, under the name of the Briggs, long before this time. In the Register of the Privy Seal is ‘ane lettre maid to Robert Hamilton in Briggis, makand him capitane and kepar of the place and palace of Linlithgow,’ &c. 1543, Aug. 22.

39 Privy Seal Register.

40 Carries.

41 Nickname.

42 Garret.

43 Searches.

44 Thievery.

45 Ere.

46 Till.

47 Ancient Scottish Poems, 2 vols. 1786.

48 Border Minstrelsy, i. 157.

49 Burgh Record of Canongate, Maitland Club Mis., ii. 303.

50 Babees, halfpence, from bas billon, a low piece of money.

51 Hume’s Hist. House of Douglas.

52 Privy Seal Register.

53 Discoverie and Historie of the Gold Mynes in Scotland. Written in 1619. Bannatyne Club, 1825.

54 Holinshed’s Chronicle.

55 The original, preserved in the General Register House, is printed at length in Pitcairn, iii. 394.

56 Privy Seal Register.

57 Council Register, quoted in Maitland’s History of Edinburgh, p. 32.

58 Ane Breve Descriptioun of the Pest, &c. 1568.

59 Mr M. Napier’s Notes to Spottiswoode’s History, Spot. Club edition.

60 Where Napier had other estates.

61 The bishop was about to go to York, to attend the investigation respecting the queen.

62 Justiciary Records, MS., Adv. Lib., quoted by Mr Mark Napier.

63 Burgh Records of Canongate, Mait. Club Mis., ii. 313.

64 The pest was severe in London in autumn 1569, whether by communication from Scotland does not appear.

65 Ane Addicioun of Scottis Cornicklis and Deidis, printed from an original manuscript by Thomas Thomson, Esq.

66 Memorials of George Bannatyne. Edited by Sir Walter Scott. Bannatyne Club-book, 1829.

67 Extracts from Canongate Council Register, Maitland Club Miscellany, ii. 814.

68 Ane Trajedie in forme of ane Diallog betwix Honour, Gude Fame, and the Authour heirof, in ane Trance. Lekprevik, 1570.

69 Dalyell’s Illustrations of Scottish History, p. 521.

70 Harrison’s translation, apud Holinshed.

71 Extracta e Chronicis Scocie. Edin. 1842.

72 Sir William Sinclair, who records these curious particulars, was Lord Justice-general of Scotland, and altogether an estimable person. According to Father Hay: ‘He gathered a great many manuscripts, which had been taken by the rabble out of our monasteries in the time of the Reformation.’—Genealogy of the Sinclairs of Roslin, edited by James Maidment, Esq. 1835. See something further about him under June 1623.

73 The distance from Bathgate to Edinburgh is eighteen miles.

74 Bannatyne’s Journal, 46.

75 Calderwood, iii. 20, 167, and note.

76 The couplet almost verbatim occurs in the prophecies of Bertlingtoun, in R. Waldegrave’s brochure, already quoted (under Jan. 1, 1561-2):

77 Eupham M‘Calyean subsequently attained still higher notoriety in the character of a witch. See under Dec. 26, 1590.

78 The whole series is printed in Abbotsford Miscellany, p. 5.

79 Crawford’s Memoirs, 215.

80 The Lady Scotland is understood to address ‘the richt honorable and godly learnit gentleman, the Laird of Dun, minister of God’s word.’

81 Bruised.

82 He ‘wes extremelie pynit in the beitis lang of befoir.’—D. O.

83 Calderwood, iii. 393.

84 The word its did not then exist, and writers were forced to use either his or her instead.

85 Humboldt’s Cosmos.

86 Brewster’s Encyclopædia.

87 Tytler, vii. 388.

88 Under the care of John Smith, youngest, the secretary of the Club. 1832.

89 So called ‘for that in old Fathers’ days the people would that day shear their heads and clip their beards, and so make them honest against Easter Day.’—Authority quoted in Brand’s Pop. Antiquities, by Ellis.

90 ‘Robert Gurlay, the duke’s servant,’ is the last in the list of persons forfeited by the parliament of James VI., August 1571.

91 Calderwood.

92 Register of the General Kirk of Edinburgh, Maitland Club Mis., i. 101.

93 Reg. of Gen. Kirk of Edinburgh, Maitland Club Mis., i. 111.

94 As this conduct was such as might lead to a collision between the parties, it is not easy to see how it illustrates the author’s proposition of Wedderburn’s pacific temper.

95 From a copy in the editor’s possession of a manuscript long preserved in Broomhouse, Berwickshire.

96 ‘There was presented to the Queen Regent (1558), by Robert Ormiston, a calf having two heads, whereat she scripped [mocked], and said: “It was but a common thing.”‘—Knox.

97 Coloured stripes sewed on a garment.

98 Fringes or trimmings.

99 This seems too high a phrase of compliment for the Regent Morton. His Grace was the ordinary phrase, according to Sir James Melville.

100 Aberdeen Council Register, Spal. Cl. Mis. i. 30.

101 Abbotsford Miscellany, 45.

102 Hist. of the House of Douglas, ii. 260.

103 The wife of the earl—Margaret Fleming, relict of the Master of Montrose and the Master of Erskine—was believed to have the powers of incantation. See under June 19, 1566.

104 The seat of the Earl of Montrose, on the skirts of the Ochil Hills.

105 Crawford’s Officers of State. Moysie’s Memoirs.

106 As much as to say, ‘Sport, and be at your ease.’

107 Moysie.

108 Calderwood.

109 Arranged—not lying as rubbish.

110 Documents Relative to Royal Receptions, 4to. Edinburgh, 1822.

111 Maitland Club Miscellany, ii. 19.

112 General Assembly, April 1578.

113 A house called the Novum Hospitium, in the Priory Park. It has long been demolished, excepting only the court-gate.

114 Atkinson’s Discoverie of Gold Mynes in Scotland.

115 Trans. Ant. Soc. Scot. iii. 312.

116 Row’s History of the Kirk of Scotland.

117 The original of this document, commonly called the King’s Confession, is preserved in the Advocates’ Library.

118 See under May 1574.

119 Fr. clientèle, dependents.

120 This Scotch law-phrase has become familiar in England, under the form of ‘art and part,’ and is not in general correctly understood. The first word is not art, but airt, meaning direction, implying that the accused was believed to have counselled and guided the actual perpetrators of the crime.

121 Powerfully.

122 A strange thing.

123 See under Jan. 1, 1561-2.

124 For the above illustrations of his remark, the author is indebted to Mr Mark Napier’s curious notes to the edition of Spottiswoode’s History published by the Spottiswoode Club.

125 ‘Item, to ane pyper and ane young boy his sone that playit in Dalkeytht upon Sonday the xj day of Junii, fra the kirk to the castell befoir his Hienes ... xxs.‘

126 A noteworthy anecdote of this lady is stated in Anderson’s History of the Family of Fraser. On the death of her first husband, the tutorship of her infant son, Lord Lovat, became a matter of contention between the child’s grand-uncle, Fraser of Struie, and his uncle Thomas; and it seemed likely there would be a fight between their various partisans. In these circumstances, a clerical gentleman of the clan, Donald Fraser Dhu, entreated the widow to interfere, and ask Struie to retire. She gave an evasive reply, remarking that whatever might befall, ‘not a drop of Stewart blood would be spilt.’ The mediator then drew his dirk, and told her ladyship with a fierce oath, that her blood would be the first that would be spilt, if she did not do as he requested. She then complied, and Thomas, the child’s uncle, was accordingly elected as tutor.

127 Calderwood.

128 Melville’s Diary.

129 He states that David Riccio was buried by the queen in the royal vault, ‘almost in the arms of Magdalene Valois,’ and thence draws a shameful inference against the chastity of Mary. To dedicate to the young king a book in which he endeavoured to prove his mother an adulteress, and the murderer of her husband, gives a strange idea of the sense of that age regarding the rules of good taste, to say nothing more.

130 On this occasion Captain Lammie was killed. Sir Walter Scott, in relating the incident in the Border Minstrelsy, expresses a hope that he was ‘the same miscreant who, in the day of Queen Mary’s distress, “his ensign being of white taffety, had painted on it the cruel murder of King Henry, and laid down before her majesty, at what time she presented herself as prisoner to the Lords.”—Birrel’s Diary.’ It was very probably so, as we find that he then, as well as now, was a hired soldier of the government. As his painted ensign makes rather a conspicuous appearance in Scottish history, it may be not unworthy of notice that the following entry occurs in the Lord Treasurer’s books, under March 18, 1567-8, nine months after the incident in question: ‘To Captain Andro Lambie for his expenses passand of Glasgow to Edinburgh to uplift certain men of weir, and to mak ane Handsenyie of white taffety, £25.’ He was then acting for the Regent Moray. It seems probable that, having spoiled his ensign by the picture of the king’s murder, he was now gratified with a new one at the expense of his employer.

131 In the parish of Carluke, Lanarkshire.

132 He remained at this fine old castle twelve days, attended by Arran, Sir Robert Melville, Secretary Maitland, Ferniehirst, Colonel Stuart, and the Master of Gray; and regaled with ‘the play of Robin Hood.’ ‘After the banquet was ended, Arran fell deadly sick.’—Cal.

133 History of King James VI.

134 Darker Superstitions of Scotland, p. 484.

135 Note in Maitland Club Miscellany, iv. 123.

136 Gregory’s History of the Western Highlands and Isles, p. 234.

137 Estate—piece of ground.

138 Threatens.

139 A horn had originally, or perhaps was still used, in proclaiming a man rebel; hence the term, horning, or being put to the horn.

140 October ... 1587, ‘his majesty raid with ane host to Peebles, for order-taking with the broken men, and returnit the tent day.’—Moysie’s Memoirs.

141 It is understood that this was the place of worship formed out of the choir or eastern portion of the church of St Giles. Opposite to the pulpit, which was attached to the first pillar from the east end, was the royal gallery or loft, also attached to a pillar. Thus the king and the minister were sufficiently near each other for the colloquies in which they occasionally indulged. See Wilson’s Memorials of Edinburgh.

142 Harrington’s Nugæ Antiquæ, by Park. 2 vols. 1804. Vol. i., p. 369.

143 A light bark with one mast.

144 Rascal.

145 Worthless fellows.

146 Value.

147 A bulk, a corpse.

148 A gun in the poop of the ship.