Lang Andrew
Highways and Byways in the Border
And hence came serious consequences to the old Covenanter. For the Marquess died, and the man whom Ringan had offended succeeded to the title and estates. He had always – so the story goes – nursed his wrath to keep it warm, and he might be depended on to pay off, with interest, all old scores against him whom he talked of as that "dour old Cameronian devil." So it happened one day, towards the time of harvest, when corn lay waiting for the sickle in the smiling haughs of Jed, the young lord and his friends, attended by servants in charge of several dogs, came on horseback across the river and began to ride up and down through Ringan's crop, ostensibly looking for hares. The old man remonstrated in vain; no heed was paid to him, and at length, goaded to fury as he saw the havoc being played among his good oates and bere, he snatched up an old musket (that perhaps had seen service at Bothwell Brig) and shot one of the dogs dead. That was enough; the old man had put himself now in the wrong. For the Marquess could plead that, after all, he had only been riding on his own land; and he and his friends could assert that the harm they had done, if any, had been infinitesimal. So the young lord rode off to Jedburgh, and had a summons issued by the Sheriff against Ringan.
It was one thing, however, to issue the summons, quite another to serve it, or afterwards to get Ringan to obey the call. If he persisted in ignoring the summons, there were not many to be found bold enough to go to Smailcleuehfoot for the purpose of haling him before the Court; old as he now was, Ringan's reputation for strength and courage, and for reckless daring, was still great enough to keep the wolves of the law at bay. "But," said the Sheriff, "the law cannot thus be flouted; if he does not come willingly, then he must be made to come." Which of course was quite the right thing to say, especially if he had at hand the force necessary to carry out his threat. But that was where the difficulty came in. Finally, the Sheriff had to go himself to arrest old Ringan, impressing on his way everybody whom he could find capable of helping, including the Marquess himself.
Ringan was warned of their coming, and advised to fly. "No!" said the old man. "I've dune no wrong. Let them touch me wha daur!" But he set about barricading his house, and when the Sheriff and his parry came on the scene they found a building with doors fast and windows shuttered, and no one visible. At their knock, Ringan appeared at a small upper window, but entirely declined to be taken, or to open the door. Then commenced a vigorous assault by the Sheriff and his party. They attempted to break in the door and to rush the building. Ringan opened fire on them with his old musket, and drove them back.
And then for a time there occurred nothing more than a fruitless exchange of shots, as one or other of the Sheriff's men left cover or Ringan showed himself at one of the windows. It appears, however, that there was in the house with the old man a young girl, either his adopted daughter or a domestic who looked after household affairs. This girl had been told to keep out of harm's way, to shelter in a "press" or cupboard well out of any possible range of bullet; but in the heat of battle the old man did not notice that curiosity had drawn her from the safety of this hiding place, and had brought her right behind him at the moment that he fired a shot through the window. It was a good shot, for it clipped away a curl from the Sheriff's wig, and perhaps in his satisfaction at going so near to his mark the old man may have showed himself a little too openly. Anyhow, at that moment two or three muskets replied, the heavy bullets coming with sullen "phut" into the woodwork of the little window-frame. But one flew straighter than the others; Ringan heard behind him a sound, half gasp, half sob, and turned just in time to see the lass sink on the floor, blood pouring from her throat. The old man tried to stanch the wound, but it needed hardly more than a glance to tell that it was far beyond his simple skill, and that she was past hope.
Then the lust of battle seized him, blind fury filled his breast, and he thought only of revenge. He forgot his age, forgot that his fighting days should have been long over, forgot everything but the mad desire to clutch the throats of his foes and to choke the life out of them. So, tearing down the barricades of his door, he rushed out on his enemies like a wild bull charging. But alas for Ringan! part of the discarded barricade caught his foot as he burst over the threshold, and down he came with a crash. Before he could struggle even to his knees, the enemy was on him, and he was down again on his face, half a dozen men swarming over him. Even yet, however, old and hopelessly outnumbered as he was, the fight for a time was not so very unequal, and he might in the end have cast off the crowd that strove to hold and bind him. An ill day it would have been for some of them had he succeeded. But a treacherous pedlar, who had joined the fray for the sake of hire, watching his chance, came behind, and with a blow from a hammer smashed Ringan's jaw and brought him to the ground, stunned. The old man was taken then, bound hand and foot, and carted off to Edinburgh. There, in the foul air of the Tolbooth he lay for eight weary years, suffering tortures great part of the time, not only from the broken jaw, but from old wounds which had broken out afresh, and which from the insanitary condition of the prison now refused to heal. It was a broken, frail old man who came out from that long imprisonment. And he never got back to his beloved Jed. Ringan Oliver died in Edinburgh in 1736; his huge frame sleeps in Greyfriars Churchyard.
As one travels up Jed by the old coach road – whose windings do not invariably desert even the abruptest elbow of the stream – road and river finally part company at the bridge below Camptown. Here the latter's course swings gradually to the right, through leafy banks and under spreading trees, whilst the former, following a straighter route, enters on a long, steady bit of collar-work up the side of a pine-clad brae where, on one hand, lies the old camp from which the adjacent little settlement derives its name, and, on the other, Edgerston, sleeping in its woods. Here once stood Edgerston Castle, which Hertford's men took "by pollicie" in 1544; – someone sold the Rutherfurd of that day. Castle and lands then belonged to the Rutherfurds, one of the most ancient families in Scotland, and still the lands are theirs.
A little way past Edgerston the road begins its long two mile climb to an elevation of close on 1500 feet near the summit of Catcleuch Shin. There, immediately after passing the Carter Bar, it crosses the Border line, and drops steadily down into Redesdale, past the new Catcleuch Reservoir that supplies Newcastle with water, a work which has wiped out of existence one of the pleasantest bits of fishing in the kingdom, where trout were many and game, and of enviable size. Perhaps the trout are there still – for those who may take them – but the capture of a dozen fish in still water cannot match the joy experienced in fighting one good Rede trout in the strong rushing stream where he has passed all his days.
Beyond the Catcleuch Reservoir, a road of easy gradients sweeps down the delightful Rede valley, past innumerable old camps, British and Roman; past Rowchester, into whose little school house, that stands solitary in the angle of two ways, are built numerous stones (carved and otherwise) handily quarried from the adjacent old Roman station of Bremenium; and high up, on the roof of the building, from the same source are various large round stone balls that may have formed part of the ammunition for a Roman ballista. It was this route that the Roman legions followed over the Cheviots in their northward march from the mighty wall they had stretched across England from sea to sea. A few miles east from Catcleuch Shin, their military road bursts suddenly into view of that glorious sweep of country where the triple-peaked Eildons dominate the scene, a landmark that no doubt led them first to the site of their famous Newstead camp. In early nineteenth century days, when His Majesty's mail coaches between Newcastle and Edinburgh came jangling over the crest of this bleak, unprotected bit of road at Catcleueh Shin, taking at a gallant trot the long, stiff gradient that faced them whether they were heading to the south or to the north, the trials of outside passengers in winter time must not seldom have been of a nature truly unenviable. Bitter sleet, driving before a westerly gale, lashed their faces and stole chill wet fingers inside their wraps and upturned collars; drifting, blinding snow, swirling on the wings of a wild north-easter, blurred the guiding line of snow-posts, and even at times hid his leaders from the coachman's sight, so that his first warning of being off the road and on the moor, was a heavy lurch as the coach buried its side in some blind hollow; frost, and a thermometer in the neighbourhood of zero, nipped from ears and nose and toes every vestige of feeling, and chilled to the very bone those whom duty or business forced to travel. It was truly a large assortment of evils that our ancestors had to choose from, in the winter, on that road over into England by the Carter Bar.
But if winter was bad, surely in the better time of year there were pleasures that atoned for all they had suffered. In the long twilight of a summer's evening, when moorland scents fill all the air and the crow of grouse echoes from the heathery knolls, what pleasure more satisfying could there be in life than to sit behind a free-going team of bays, listening lazily to the rhythm of the chiming hoofs, to the ring of steel bitts and the merry jingle of the splinter-bars? And as the coach breasted the summit, and began to make up time on the down gradient, the glorious view that broke on the eye of the north bound passenger of itself would make amends for halt the ills of life. Away to the west, stretched ever more dim in the fading sunset glow, the long-flung line of Cheviots – Carterfell, the Carlin's Tooth (where springs the infant Jed), Peel Fell, Hartshorn Pyke, all blending, far down, into the round green hills of Liddesdale; then, more to the north-westward, set in the wide expanse, the Windburgh Hill and Cauldcleuch Head; farther off, away over the high land of upper Teviotdale,
"The far grey riot of the Ettrick hills,"
and the dim shapes of the mighty "Laws" of Peeblesshire – Broad Law, Dollar Law, Black Law. Then far below this vantage point on Catcleuch Shin, in middle foreground Edgerston's darkening woods; beyond, Ruberslaw, Minto Crags, – "where falcons hang their giddy nest," – and the Dunion; then, to the right, Eildon's cloven peak, and, near-by, the Blac k Hill at Earlston, with the Lammermuirs in dimmest background; to the right again, Smailholme Tower, erect and watchful; east of that, the green Merse, wide-spread like a map, stretched almost to the sea, and on the extreme right, far off, Cheviot himself, blocking the view. What a truly magnificent sweep of country it is! A sense of space, and room to breathe, such as one finds seldom in this country.
Three hundred and thirty-eight years ago, however, there were Scots and English assembled on that Catcleuch ridge one summer's day, who had no eyes for the view;
"The seventh of July, the suith to say,
At the Reidswire the tryst was set;
Our Wardens they affixed the day,
And, as they promised, so they met.
Alas! that day I'll ne'er forget!"
As was customary, the English and Scottish Wardens of the Marches had met for the discussion and settlement of Border claims and disputes, and for the redressing of wrongs. Sir John Carmichael in this instance acted for Scotland, Sir John Forster for England. The former was accompanied by the young Scott of Buccleuch, – according to Sir Walter the same who, twenty-one years later, was famous for the rescue of Kinmont Willie from Carlisle Castle, – by sundry Armstrongs, Elliots, Douglases, Turnbulls of Rule Water, and other wild Borderers.
"Of other clans I cannot tell
Because our warning was not wide."
But it was a turbulent band, one would think, and not easy of control. Forster had at his back Fenwicks – "five hundred Fenwicks in a flock," says the ballad, – Shaftoes, Collingwoods, and other of the great English Border families, the men from Hexham and thereabout, and many of the fiercest fighters of Redesdale and Tynedale, the two latter said to be then the most lawless people of the North of England. Indeed, their reputation was so evil that the merchants of Newcastle passed a by-law in the year 1564 that no apprentices should be taken "proceeding from such leude and wicked progenitors."; Thus it may be seen that both nations were strongly represented, and that on both sides there was superabundance of most inflammable material waiting but for a spark to set it ablaze. In most promising and peaceful fashion, however, the proceedings opened:
"Yett was our meeting meek eneugh;
Begun wi' merriment and mowes.
Some gaed to drink, and some stude still,
And some to cards and dice them sped."
And all went smoothly and well, till the case of one Robson, a notorious Redesdale horse and cattle-thief, came up for discussion. The Scottish warden, following the usual Border custom in such cases, demanded that the culprit, having been guilty of theft on the northern side of the March, should be given into Scottish custody till such time as reparation be made to the parties robbed by the Redesdale man. Sir John Forster demurred, giving as his reason for evading the usual practice in such cases, that Robson had fled and could not be captured. "Oh! Play fair!" cried Carmichael contemptuously. Whereupon Forster not unnaturally lost his temper, and made a fierce and insulting reply. Hot words leapt from angry lips, and swords, which in those days were never long idle, began to flash in the warm sunshine as they left the scabbards. And then the Tynedale men – "Fy, Tyndale, to it!" – eager to take time by the forelock, and determined not to stand out of what fray might be going, loosed off a flight of arrows among the Scots. And all the fat was in the fire. Like fiercest wolves, the two sides flew at each other's throats, trampling over the heathery ground, cursing, slashing, stabbing.
The Scots at first were getting rather the worst of the affray; Carmichael was down, and a prisoner; others were disabled. The English had the slope of the hill slightly in their favour and made the most of their advantage, gradually forcing their foes to fall back in tardy and sullen retreat. Then came to the hot headed Tynedale men the irresistible temptation to plunder. It was customary at those Wardens' Meetings for pedlars or small tradesmen to erect on the ground selected for the meeting, tents, or, as we say in Scotland, "crames," sort of temporary shop-counters sheltered by canvas, in or on which they displayed the wares they had for sale. So it had been at this Reidswire Meeting. And as the Scots were forced back past those "crames," the desire for loot proved too strong for some of the English combatants. By ones and twos, as opportunity offered, they edged away from the fight, and, like marauding wasps to crop of ripe plums, made for this booty that might be had for the taking. Fighting and plunder were equally congenial to the men of Tynedale.
At that very moment, however, in which a large number had so withdrawn themselves, unfortunately for them reinforcements arrived for the Scots. "Jethart's here!" rang out over the roar and stress of the fight, and into the "tulzie" plunged the men of Jedburgh, hot off their ten mile march.
"Bauld Rutherfurd, he was fou stout,
Wi' a' his nine sons him about;
He led the toun o' Jedburgh out,
All bravely fought that day."
The tables were badly turned on the English; now they in turn began to give way, and to be forced back up the hill down which till now they had been successfully pressing the Scots. Too late the Tynedale men tried to retrieve their error; the Scots got them on the run and gave no breathing space; speedily the run became a rout. Over the crest into Redesdale fled the discomfited English, dropping here a man, there a man, as they fled. "Sir George Hearoune of Schipsydehouse," (Sir George Heron Miles of Chipchase Castle,) fell early in the fight, and four and twenty dead bowmen kept him company. The wounded on both sides were many; and among the prisoners taken by the Scots were the English Warden, Sir James Ogle, Sir Cuthbert Collingwood, Sir Francis Russell (son of the Earl of Bedford), several Fenwicks, and other leading men from the English side of the Border. Carmichael took his prisoners to Edinburgh – not greatly to the comfort of the Scottish Regent, the Earl of Morton; for England and Scotland were then, for once in a way, at peace, and such an incident as this Raid of the Reidswire was but too likely to result in further war between the nations. Therefore, after a day or two's detention, or rather, perhaps, after a day or two's entertainment, Morton, with every expression of regret and of regard, sent all the prisoners back to England, apparently not ill pleased with their treatment. No international complications followed the affair. Carmichael was sent to York to explain matters, and he seems to have been able to show satisfactorily that the Scots were within their rights throughout; that, in fact, as the ballad says:
".. pride, and breaking out of feuid
Garr'd Tindaill lads begin the quarrel."
Some years ago, a very handsome silver mounted sword, and a fine specimen of a dagger, were unearthed by a man employed in cutting drains on the hillside where the battle was fought that July day of 1575. The sword was a beautiful weapon, of fine temper, and it probably belonged to one of the English leaders. Unfortunately it has been lost. Both it and the dagger have, as I understand, mysteriously disappeared from the house in which they were kept. Somebody too greatly admired them, one may suppose, and followed the example set by the men of Tynedale in the heat of battle that day.
The scene of the fight is that fairly level bit of moorland to the left of the road just after you quit the Carter Bar, going south.
Harking back now for a moment to Jed, – five or six miles above the bridge at Camptown where we quitted the line of river to follow the old coach road over Carter Fell, we come to Southdean. Here are the ruins of an ancient church, (the foundations, at least, and part of the walls and tower,) which have lately been dug out from the great green mound with its big ash trees atop, which lay these two hundred years and more between hillside and river, down by the little grey bridge. This is the "churche in a fayre launde called Zedon," wherein, says Froissart, Douglas and the other Scottish leaders met on the eve of that expedition into England which ended with the glorious fight of Otterbourne. "I never heard the old song of Percy and Douglas," wrote Sir Philip Sidney, "that I found not my heart more moved than with a trumpet;" and who is there to-day, in spite of lapse of centuries, whose blood does not quicken at the very sound of the word "Otterbourne."
It used to be said that the "Zedon" of Froissart was more applicable to Yetholm than to Southdean. Some, indeed, still maintain that, as far at least as sound is concerned, "Zedon" (the "Z", as was formerly not uncommon, being treated as a "Y") bears a much greater resemblance to "Yethoim" than to "Southdean." One may readily admit that as it is spelled, "South-dean" is not in the least like "Zedon." But it is an entirely different affair when we come to a matter of local pronunciation. In this case the pronunciation is, as near as may be, "Seuden." If we very slightly soften the sound of the letter "Z," and allow for the fact that the "e" of Zedon would naturally be used by Froissart with the same value that it bears in his own language, we arrive absolutely at the local pronunciation of the name – "Seuden."
In any case, it seems most unlikely that the point of assembly could have been Yetholm, if only for the reason that when marching from there into England, – presumably by way of the Bowmont valley, and so past Wooler and through Northumberland, – Douglas would have exposed himself to be struck in rear and on his left flank from the adjacent vantage points of Roxburgh and Wark, both of which formidable strongholds were then in English hands, and, (seeing that the intention of the Scots to make an invasion had long been known in Northumberland,) probably held in force. And certainly, if the column came by way of Ottercops and Rothely Crags, as it is said to have done, its starting point was not Yetholm. Obviously, too, a Scottish army concentrated at Southdean was in a much better strategical position than any that it could have occupied in the neighbourhood of Yetholm. From Southdean it could strike either way at will, either over the easy, and necessarily well known, pass by Catcleuch Shin, or across the hills by the old Roman way, the Whele Causeway, into Liddesdale, and thence on to Carlisle.
This Scottish plan, to assemble an army here at Southdean, was the outcome of a meeting held some time previously at Aberdeen, a city "on the fronter of the Wylde Scottes," and, so far as was possible, the business had been kept secret; even to the King himself no hint was given of what the Nobles designed, "for," said they among themselves, "the King is no manne of warre." But "the Scottes coude nat do their maters so secretly, but the lords of Englande knewe howe men rose in Scotland, and how they shulde mete agayne at Gedeours." Spies brought word to Northumberland of what was afoot, and the English took all necessary steps to upset the Scottish plan of campaign. If the Scots decided to come by way of Carlisle, then the English resolved that they, on their part, would burst into Scotland by way of Berwick, or by Dunbar. Thus, said they, "we shall do them more dommage than they can do us, for their countrey is all open; we maye go where we lyst, and our countre is strong, and the townes and castelles well closed."
Now the Scots had gathered at Southdean this August of 1388 so vast an army that "in threscore yere before there was nat assembled toguyder in Scotlande suche a nombre of good men; there were xii hundred speares and xl thousande men besvde with their archers; but in tyme of nede the Scottes can lytell skyll with their bowes; they rather beare axes, wherwith they gyve great strokes." And this army, "whan they were thus mette togyder in the marchesse of Gedours… were mery, and sayd, they wolde never entre againe into their owne houses tyll they had ben in Englande, and done suche dedes there that it shulde be spoken of xx yere after." To this gathering at Southdean came an English spy, one who "knewe right well the marchesse of Scotlande, and specially the forest of Gedeours." Without arousing suspicion, this man made his way into the church, and overheard the Scottish leaders discuss their plans. And when he had picked up information enough for his purpose, he withdrew quietly from the building and went to get his horse, which he had left in a convenient spot, tied to a tree. But never a trace of horse nor of harness was there now, "for a Scotte, who be great theves, had stollen hym awaye." It was a very tight corner for the spy. He durst make no great outcry, lest he betray himself; so, in default, he started "forthe afote, boted and spurred," thinking maybe to slip out of the camp unobserved and make over the Cheviots into Rede valley. In any other place but the Border, perhaps he might have got clear away. But the Borderers have ever been horse lovers, and now the unwonted sight of a man, booted and spurred, footing it, at once drew eyes to him that might have taken little heed had he been mounted. "A filthie thing," says Bishop Leslie, writing of the Borderers in the sixteenth century, "a filthie thing thay estcime it, and a verie abjecte man thay halde him that gangis upon his fete, ony voyage. Quhairthrough cumis that al are horsmen." So the spy had not gone many furlongs ere he was stopped by two mounted men.
"Felowe," said one of the two to the other, "I have sene a marveyle; beholde yonder a man goeth alone, and as I thynke, he hath lost his horse, for he came by and spake no worde; I wene he be none of our company; lette us ryde after him to prove my saying." So, says Froissart, they went after him. And "whane he sawe them commynge, he wolde gladly have ben thens." The spy's answers to questions not being satisfactory, "they brought hym againe to the church of Zedon and presented him to the Erle Duglas and to other lordes." And there "they handled hym in suche wise that he was fayne to shewe all the mater." Their methods were not gentle in those days; one wonders what they did. Anyhow, "they knew by hym that the lordes of Northumberland had sent hym thyder, to know the estate of their enterprise, and whiche waye they wolde drawe. Hereof the Scottes were right joyous, and wolde nat for a great good but that they had spoken with this squyer."
Scottish arguments proved too strong for the unhappy Englishman: "Sirs," said he at last, "sithe it behoveth me to saye the truthe, I shall." So he gave information of the whereabouts of the English army, and disclosed the whole of the English plans, telling how, the force at the disposal of the Northumbrian lords not being strong enough to stand up against the Scottish host, the intention of the English leaders was that if the Scots should "take the waye into Gales [Cumberland] they wyll go by Berwike, and so to Dunbare, to Edinborowe, or els to Alquest [Dalkeith]; and if ye take nat that waye, then they wyll go by Carlyle, and into the mountayns of the countrey. Whan the lordes herde that, eche of them regarded other." As indeed they had excellent cause, for this information put into their hands a card that could most effectually trump their adversary's strongest suit. They were "ryght joyfull," says Froissart, and "demannded counsayle what way was best for them to take."
Accordingly, the main army was despatched over the hills, probably, and most naturally, up Jed and the Raven Burn, and across into Liddesdale by the old Roman road that leaves Carlin Tooth and Wheelrig Head on its left, and follows down Peel Burn to Liddel Water; thence down the Liddel Valley the marching would be easy to Longtown and on to Carlisle; whilst Douglas, with a flying column consisting of "thre hundred speares of chosen men, and of two thousande other men and archers," went up the Carter Burn and over the easy pass at Catcleuch Shin into Redesdale, with intent to "drawe towardes Newcastell upon Tyne, and passe the ryver and entre into the bysshoprike of Durham, and burne and exyle the country." "Thus these two hoostes departed eche from other, echo of them prayenge other, that if the Englysshmen folowed any of their armyes, nat to fyght with them tyll bothe their armyes were joyned toguyder. Thus in a mornyng they departed fro Gedeours, and toke the feldes."
Down the Rede valley – all fairly easy going in the dry August weather, even at that day, one may suppose; Froissart says the weather was "fayre and temperate," – and across Tyne, Douglas pushed rapidly, pausing neither to burn nor to slay, until he came into Durham, "where they founde a good countrey. Than they beganne to make warre, to slee people, and to brinne vyllages, and to do many sore displeasures." Everyone knows what happened after this; how at length, having skirmished right up to the walls of Durham, and beyond, Douglas and his men turned again northward and halted two days before Newcastle, where lay Percy, and English knights so many that "they wyst not where to lodge"; how, wjilst the Scots remained here, Douglas and Percy fought, and Douglas overthrew Percy and took from him a trophy which the latter swore to redeem before it could be carried from Northumberland; and how Percy, coming up with the Scots at Otterburne, strove to regain that which he had lost at Newcastle, and was defeated and made prisoner; how the fight raged throughout the moon lit night far into the morning, and the trampled heath lay red with more than the bloom of heather; and how Earl Douglas was slain. It is all told in the ballad, and how valiantly each fought where cowards had no place.
It fell about the Lammas tide,
When the muir-men win their hay,
The doughty Douglas bound him to ride
Into England to drive a prey.
He chose the Gordons and the Graemes,
With them the Lindsays, licht and gay,
But the Jardines wald not with him ride,
And they rue it to this day.=
And he has harried the dales o' Tyne
And half o' Bambroughshire;
And three good towers on Reidswire fells,
He left them a' on fire.
And he march'd up to New Castel,
And rade it round about:
"O, wha is the lord o' this castel,
Or wha is the ladie o't?"
But up spak proud Lord Percy then,
And O but he spak hie!
"It's I am the lord o' this castel,
My wife's the ladie gay."
"If thou art the lord o' this castel,
Sae weel it pleases me!
For ere I cross the Border fells,
The ane o' us shall dee."
He took a lang spear in his hand,
Shod with the metal free;
And forth to meet the Douglas there,
He rade right furiouslie.
But O, how pale his ladie look'd
Frae aff the castel wall,
When down before the Scottish spear
She saw proud Percy fa'!
"Had we twa been upon the green,
And never an eye to see,
I wad hae had you, flesh and fell,
But your sword shall gae wi' me."
"But gae ye up tae Otterbourne,
And bide there dayis three;
And gin I come not ere they end,
A fause knight ca' ye me."
"The Otterboume's a bonny burn,
'Tis pleasant there to be;
But there is nought at Otterbourne
To feed my men and me.=
"The deer rins wild on hill and dale,
The birds fly wild frae tree to tree;
But there is neither bread nor kail
To fend my men and me.
"Yet I will stay at Otterbourne,
Where you shall welcome be;
And, if you come not at three dayis end,
A fause knight I'll ca' thee."
"Thither will I come," proud Percy said,
"By the micht of Our Ladye!"
"There will I bide thee," said the Douglas,
"My troth I plight to thee."
They lichted high on Otterbourne,
Upon the brent sae brown;
They lichted high on Otterbourne,
And threw their pallions down.
And he that had a bonnie boy,
Sent out his horse to grass;
And he that had not a bonnie boy,
His ain servant he was.
Then up and spak a little page,
Before the peep of dawn:
"O waken ye, waken ye, my good lord,
For Percy's hard at hand."
"Ye lie, ye lie, ye liar loud!
Sae loud I hear ye lie;
For Percy had not men yestreen
To fight my men and me.
"But I hae dreamed a dreary dream,
Beyond the Isle of Skye:
I saw a dead man win a fight,
And I think that man was I."
He belted on his gude braid sword,
And to the field he ran;
But he forgot the helmet good
That shou'd have kept his brain.=
When Percy with the Douglas met,
I wat he was fu' fain!
They swakkit swords till sair they swat,
And the blood ran down like rain.
But Percy, wi' his good braid sword,
That could sae sharply wound,
Has wounded Douglas on the brow,
Till he fell till the ground.
Then he call'd on his little foot-page,
And said – "Run speedilie,
And fetch my ain dear sister's son,
Sir Hugh Montgomerie."
"My nephew good," the Douglas said.
"What recks the death o' ane!
Last nicht I dream'd a dreary dream,
And I ken the day's thy ain.
"My wound is deep; I fain would sleep;
Take thou the vanguard of the three,
And hide me by the bracken bush
That grows on yonder lily lee.
"O, bury me by the bracken bush,
Beneath the blooming brier;
Let never living mortal ken
That a kindly Scot lies here."
He lifted up that noble lord,
With the saut tear in his ee;
He hid him in the bracken bush,
That his merrie men might not see.
The moon was clear, the day drew near,
The spears in flinders flew
But mony a gallant Englishman
Ere day the Scotsmen slew.
The Gordon's gude, in English bluid
They steep'd their hose and shoon;
The Lindsays flew like fire about,
Till a' the fray was dune.=
The Percy and Montgomerie met,
That either of other was fain;
They swakkit swords, and they twa swat,
And aye the bluid ran down between.
"Now yield thee, yield thee, Percy," he said,
"Or else I vow I'll lay thee low!"
"To whom must I yield," quoth Earl Percy,
"Sin' I see that it maun be so?"
"Thou shall not yield to lord or loun,
Nor yet shalt thou yield to me;
But yield ye to the brarken bush
That grows upon yon lilye lee!"
"I will not yield to a bracken bush,
Nor yet will I yield to a brier;
But I would yield to Earl Douglas,
Or Sir Hugh Montgomerie if he were here."
As soon as he knew it was Montgomerie,
He stuck his sword's point in the gronde;
Montgomerie was a courteous knight,
And quickly took him by the hond.
This deed was done at Otterbourne,
About the breaking o' the day;
Earl Douglas was buried by the bracken bush,
And the Percy led captive away.
Froissart says he was told by two English squires who took part in the fight, "how this batayle was as sore a batayle fought as lyghtly hath been harde of before of such a nombre, and I believe it well. For Englysshmen on the one partye and Scottes on the other party are good men of warre: for whan they mete there is a hard fight without sparvnge; there is no hoo bytwene them as long as speares, swordes, axes, or dagers wyll endure, but lay on eche upon other, and whan they be well beaten, and that the one parte hath optaygned the victory, they than glorifye so in their dedes of armes and are so joyfull, that suche as be taken they shall be raunsomed or they go out of the felde, so that shortly eche of them is so contente with other that at their departynge curtoysly they wyll saye, God thanke you. But in fyghtynge one with another there is no playe nor sparynge; and this is trewe, and that shall well apere by this sayd rencounter, for it was as valyauntly foughten as coulde be devysed."
