CHAPTER XI.
WAR BETWEEN ENGLAND AND SCOTLAND—DEATH OF JAMES V.
(1542.)
PREPARATIONS FOR WAR.
It is easy to imagine the wrath of Henry VIII. when he found himself alone at York. He had made an agreement with his nephew; he had left London to have a conference with him; he had made great preparations; he had gone to the north; and then the young man was missing at the rendezvous! He was beside himself with anger. His sister, the mother of James, had died at the end of November 1541. But even if she had lived it was hardly likely that her influence would have appeased the rage of the king. He was provoked not only because his favorite project broke down just at the moment when he expected to see it carried out, but still more by the intolerable affront which the King of Scotland had just offered him. He could not endure it, and he swore that he would wash his name and his memory of that insult by a startling act of vengeance. He wrote to James letters full of the sharpest reproaches and the most violent menaces. ‘I have still in my hand,’ said he, ‘the very rod which chastised your father.’ That rod was the duke of Norfolk, who while earl of Surrey had commanded at Flodden, where James IV. was killed. Henry immediately authorized piratical expeditions by sea, and invasions on the Scottish borders; but these pirates and marauders were only the precursors of the chastisements which he was preparing.
James was frightened; and as it was to please his prelates that he had failed to keep his promise, it was his wish that the expenses of the war should fall on them. He told them that, thanks to them, he was going to war with the King of England, and demanded the subsidies which they had promised. ‘If you do not furnish me with them,’ he added, ‘I shall have no choice but to confer with my uncle and satisfy his wishes.’ This menace terrified the prelates; ‘for rather would they have gone to hell.’[246] What would France say? What would the pope say? thought the cardinal. The bishops promised mountains of gold. After deliberation on the matter, they agreed to give the king fifty thousand crowns a year so long as the war lasted. They added, that their servants and other dependents who were exempt from military service would take up arms. These promises filled the heart of the rash young monarch with confidence and pride. Troops were sent to Jedburgh and to Kelso, and the priests and all their party were pluming themselves on their wealth and their power, and talking of nothing but their victory. They were mad with joy, and were already dreaming of again bringing England under the papal sway. It was possible for an instant to suppose that they were right. The parliament of England had not shown itself so forward as the clergy of Scotland; its members had closed their ears to Henry’s demands for money. This slackened his preparations for war. There were, however, some troops on the frontier, and they formed the design of seizing Jedburgh. The earl Angus and Sir George Douglas, his brother, who had been banished from Scotland for some years, joined these troops, which numbered four thousand men. But the Scots had taken their measures. Lord Huntley, at the head of a large force, encountered the English troops at Halidon on August 24. The fight was already begun, when another Scottish party appeared. The English, perceiving that they were in danger of being surrounded, retreated. Only a few were killed, but very many were taken prisoners.[247]
There was no longer any limit to the joy of prelate and priest. They encouraged the king; they vaunted themselves as if they had in person gained a victory. In bishops’ palaces, in the parsonages of priests, and in the convents of monks, nothing was heard but shouts of triumph. ‘All is ours,’ said they; ‘they are but heretics. If we be a thousand and they ten thousand, they dare not fight. France shall enter the one part and we the other, and so shall England be conquered within a year.’[248]
PROJECTS OF HENRY VIII.
James, notwithstanding his imprudence, did not indulge in these foolish illusions. He knew that Henry VIII. was much stronger than himself. The blow which the wrath of his uncle had inflicted on him made him turn from left to right. He wished to take advantage of the petty victory of Halidon for making peace with England. Persecution ceased in Scotland, and liberty of conscience was more liberally granted. On the day after the engagement, and before James was informed of the result, he had already written to Henry, and had asked him for passports for his plenipotentiaries. On September 1 he wrote to him again: ‘We assure you, dearest uncle,’ said he, ‘there is within our realm neither of spiritual nor temporal state that may or shall change our favor and kindness toward you.’[249] But Henry was not of such an easy temper: he bore in mind the affront at York, and he intended to avenge it. He forbade the ambassadors of his nephew to pass beyond that city. During this time he was collecting all kinds of munitions of war, and in very large quantities. He assembled an army such as Scotland had not for a long time seen at her borders, and gave the command of it to that duke of Norfolk who was to defeat the son as he had defeated the father. The King of England wanted also to be the king of Scotland, and wished that the whole of Great Britain should belong to the same prince. This dream was one day to be realized, but with this great difference, that it would not be the King of England who should become king of Scotland, but the King of Scotland who should become king of England. We find in the State Papers the following despatch, addressed by the English privy council to the archbishop of York:—‘Minding to have the king’s majesty’s title to the realm of Scotland more fully, plainly, and clearly set forth to all the world, that the justness of our quarrel and demand may appear, we have appointed certain learned men to travail in the same. And for because we knew that your lordship in times past hath taken some pains in the same thing, we pray you not only to cause all your old registers and ancient places to be sought, where you think anything may be found for the more clear declaration to the world of his majesty’s title to that realm, and so what shall be found to certify us thereof accordingly; but also to signify unto us what ancient charters and monuments for that purpose you have seen, and where the same are to be sought for.’ For having failed to make the promised visit, James must lose his crown. Once let the King of England have possessed himself of Scotland (thanks to his soldiers, without doubt, more than to his charters and muniments), he would banish popery and establish his own bishops in its place, and above all his own papacy.
Henry published a manifesto in which he declared that his nephew had been the aggressor. He claimed for the Tudors the crown of the Stuarts. He resented as bitterly as ever the wound received at York; and the vengeance which he reckoned on taking was to be cruel, memorable, and revolutionary. The energy of the uncle was as conspicuous as the feebleness of the nephew; and when James wrote again with all naïveté, ‘I love you,’ Henry replied savagely, ‘I hate you.’
Norfolk, impatient to avenge the retreat from Halidon, determined to make an inroad into Scotland before the whole of the army was mustered. He therefore marched from Berwick, at the northeastern extremity of England, ravaged the country districts, took several unimportant places, got himself into various scrapes, and announced that he should immediately appear at Edinburgh. But within eight or ten days after passing the Borders he withdrew. He had merely paid an unceremonious visit, preliminary to one official and in state.
MUTINY OF THE SCOTS.
Meanwhile James was putting himself into a position to receive that visit gallantly, and was assembling his army before Edinburgh. He had there about twenty thousand men, besides ten thousand more on the frontier, under the command of the earl of Huntley. But dissension prevailed in his camp. There were some who cared little for the old doctrine, but who were eager above everything to break the iron yoke of the cardinal. Others there were, attached to the Douglases and the Anguses, who were in the English army, and who had no mind to fight against them. Others, again, feeling the inferiority of the Scottish army, steadily insisted that they ought to remain strictly on the defensive. On a sudden, the Scots encamped at Fala learnt that for want of supplies the English were retreating on the Tweed. James, who was easily excited, immediately called together his lords, and exclaimed, ‘Forward! follow me into England!’ His words were received in a gloomy silence. ‘We are ready, sire,’ said some of the lords to him, ‘to risk life and whatsoever we have to defend your person and your realm, but we do not see any sufficient reason for invading England. Our provisions are spent, our horses wearied; and as for ourselves, we have so long been absent from our homes, that we think it high time to return.’
James dissembled his chagrin, and even assumed an air of approval of the discretion of his lords. But he trembled to see his kingly authority trampled under foot by his subjects. He was plainly master no longer. His subservience to the priests had ruined him. The nobles and the common soldiers, instead of falling upon the English, returned every man to his own home, and the king, abandoned and left almost alone, consumed by the profound vexation which was gradually wearing him away, returned mournfully to Edinburgh.
It was now November 2 or 3. He immediately convoked a council at Holyrood palace. But in his rage against the nobles, he summoned only the bishops, the priests, and their partisans; all those who made a trade of pandering to the passions of the prince and who had no other aim but to secure the triumph of the clergy. When they saw the king’s discouragement, and his anger against the nobles, they persuaded themselves that the moment was come for them to make an end of their enemies. That, they thought, would not be very difficult. These men, branded by public opinion, did not care to furnish evidence in support of their denunciations. The only trouble they took was to deprive the innocent of all means of clearing themselves. They thought that it would for the moment suffice them to obtain a hearing, to accuse some noble of heresy and to call as witnesses certain men of infamous character in their own pay. With one accord, therefore, they all strove to inflame the king against the Reformation and its friends. Oliver Sinclair, among the laymen, distinguished himself in these proceedings, and among the churchmen, Beatoun. ‘The cardinal and the priests,’ it was said, ‘cast fagots in the fire with all their force.’[250] They drew up a list containing the names of all of whom they wished to be rid. There were the names of about one hundred nobles, among whom were Lord Hamilton, the first person of the realm after the king, the earls of Cassilis and Glencairn, the earl Marshal, and other nobles, all well disposed towards the Word of God.[251] This fact shows what progress the Reformation had made in Scotland. The majority of these suspects, to be sure, were not decided evangelical Christians, but they had leanings that way. Once already James had refused to accept such a list. But the case was different now, and he accepted it at once, and expressed to the prelates his regret that he had so long set their counsels aside. ‘I see clearly at this moment that you are right,’ he said; ‘the nobles neither desire my honor nor my continuance; for they would not ride a mile for my pleasure to follow enemies. Will ye therefore find me the means that I may have raid made in England without their knowledge and consent, that may be known to be my own raid, and I shall bind me to your counsel forever.’
A PROSCRIPTION LIST.
The joy of the cardinal and his friends was unbounded. They congratulated each other, they clapped their hands;[252] the game was won. They made promises one to another of diligent service, discretion, and fidelity. They encountered however some few difficulties. The king required before all else an invasion, and he wanted to be able to say to the nobles, ‘Where you fell back I advanced and have conquered.’ How proceed so as to insure success in the enterprise? They resolved to select as the battle-field not the east, in the direction of Berwick, where the forces of Henry VIII. lay, but the northwestern quarter, which was stripped, left without an army, almost without a garrison. Carlisle would presently be taken, and James would triumph at the same time over the nobles and the king of England.
He attached the utmost importance to this deed of arms. The royal banner was secretly brought out, letters were addressed to the men selected by the priests, inviting them to meet the king on such a day, at such a place. The bishops undertook to bear the expenses of this affair. The cardinal and the earl of Arran, by way of diversion, went eastward, as if the Scots purposed to pass the frontier in that quarter, where frequent combats had taken place between them and the English. The king, satisfied with all these preparations, and entertaining no doubt of success, accepted the fatal list presented by the cardinal and put it into his pocket. Immediately after his triumph and in the very midst of his glory, all those suspected should be seized and executed. The Reformation should be extinguished, and Rome should definitively reign. Everything was to be done with the strictest secrecy.
On the night before the day appointed for setting out, James slept at Lochmaben,[253] where stood one of the royal castles. There, without incurring any danger, he was as near as possible to the scene of the exploits all the honor of which he wished to reap. Troops arrive from all sides, without any knowledge of what was wanted with them. On the day fixed, at midnight, the trumpets sound, the companies are formed, and the command is given to march forward ‘in the suite of the king,’ who was supposed to be with the expedition. At daybreak begins the campaign which is to deliver up Scotland into the cruel hands of the cardinal. The Scots approach the territory of England and pass the water without meeting any resistance. They set fire to the houses and corn fields which lie on their way, and the poor dwellers in those country places, starting out of their sleep, see before them to their great amazement an army of ten thousand men, and flames shooting up on all sides. They tremble with fright and resign themselves to despair, wondering in themselves how such an army could possibly have advanced so far without their having the faintest suspicion of it. Whence comes it? Whither is it going? Is it come from the abyss of hell?
ROUT OF THE SCOTS.
Everything about this expedition was indeed extraordinary, and even the Scots themselves did not know who was in command. Lord Maxwell, warden of the western marches, was present, and to him that office naturally belonged; but neither he nor the troops knew anything at all about the matter. At ten o’clock an unexpected event occurred. The Scots finding themselves on English ground at Solway, the trumpets were sounded, the army halted, and the royal flag was displayed and floated in the midst of them. The wretched Oliver Sinclair mounted on a kind of shield formed by lances which rested on the shoulders of some of the soldiers. He presented letters which had been sent him by the king. This prince, in the belief that this worthless courtier was a great captain, had named him commander-in-chief. These letters were read to the army, and the favorite had himself proclaimed lieutenant-general, with orders to render obedience to him as to the king himself. By what the courtiers said, to put Sinclair at the head of the army was to make victory certain. James would not rely upon any of his nobles. Not one of them was to have the glory of the expedition; it was to be the achievement of James, to whom the command belonged. Maxwell was present at that ceremony, seeing everything, hearing everything, and he was astounded at it, ‘but he thought more than he spoke.’[254] Other lords who were present did the same. No sooner had the proclamation been read than murmurs, discouragement, and disorder spread through the army. At the same time the English took up arms in all haste, ten in one company, twenty in another. Carlisle closed its gates, and shortly after about five hundred horsemen appeared on the neighboring heights for the purpose of reconnoitring the Scottish force.[255] The Scots took these horsemen for the advance guard of the army of the duke of Norfolk, and being seized with a panic terror, many of them broke from the ranks. Some wanted to fight, others wanted to fly. Everything was disorder and confusion. The troops disbanded and took to flight in all directions. Lord Maxwell, who had foreseen from the first moment the end of this mad business, alighted from his horse and spoke to some friends. ‘To horse and fly,’ they said to him. ‘Nay,’ replied he, ‘I will rather abide here the chance that it shall please God to send me than to go home and then be hanged.’[256] The Scots, both horse and foot, threw away their arms and ran with all their might. A great number of them were taken prisoners by the soldiers of Henry VIII., and some were captured by Scottish adventurers and sold to the English.[257] To such a degree had James’s soldiers lost heart, that those who did not fall into the hands of men rushed into houses and surrendered themselves to women.[258] The water had to be recrossed: the tide was high, the river deep. Many were drowned, and a good number of those who escaped the river perished in the marshes. Oliver Sinclair, who was ‘fleeing full manfully,’[259] was captured without having struck a single blow. The most distinguished among the Scottish nobles, the earls of Cassilis and Glencairn, the Lords Somerville, Grey, and Oliphant, were seen laying down their arms. Maxwell found thus the fate which he had desired. These lords and gentlemen were sent to London and committed to the Tower. Two days after, Henry commanded that they should pass through the streets of London on foot, exposed thus as a spectacle to the populace,[260] like the captives who adorned the triumphs of Roman generals. When they arrived at the palace, they were received there by the Lord Chancellor, who addressed to them severe rebukes, accused them of having violated the faith of treaties, and extolled the goodness and clemency of Henry VIII., who assigned them various houses for their abode.
MURDER OF AN ENGLISH ENVOY.
During the battle, if such a word is to be used, James, who took good care to keep out of it, was concealed in his castle at Lochmaben, northeast of Dumfries.[261] There he was awaiting the issue of that famous expedition which was to be his title to glory. He had made sure of taking at the first blow the town of Carlisle, situated at a distance of some miles from the frontier, and formerly one of the principal military posts of the Romans, at which the wall of Hadrian terminated, and which had been more than once besieged and taken. Thence he hoped to pass on and reach York, and pay an armed visit to his dear uncle there. He was expecting the tidings of his triumph, when some of the fugitives made known to him the total rout of his army. Overwhelmed with sudden fear and astonishment, he could hardly utter a word. It was night when he heard of his defeat, and not daring to venture before daylight into unknown, untrodden ways, he retired to bed, but without finding the least repose. His distress was unbounded. He experienced the most acute pangs, could hardly breathe, and only uttered some vague cries. The manner in which his unworthy favorite had deceived his expectation, his defeat and flight, disturbed him as much as the victory of the English. He got up, paced up and down in his chamber, uttered lamentations, and cried out—‘Oh, fled Oliver? Is Oliver taken? Oh, fled Oliver?’[262] He was attacked with a kind of catalepsy. The constant contemplation of that extraordinary defeat and of the conduct of that despicable man on whom he had rested his hopes had in some degree suspended sensation in him, and he lay as in a long and painful trance until his death, continually repeating, ‘Oh, fled Oliver?’
The next morning, November 25, 1542, the king returned to Edinburgh. He could hardly conceal his disgrace in his splendid palace; and there a new disgrace was reported to him which still further heightened his grief. On November 14, two envoys from the duke of Norfolk had arrived there with a letter addressed to the king. The cardinal had replied that he was gone a-hunting in Fifeshire. Ten days later, on the fatal day of Solway, towards evening, when the English envoys on their return were approaching Dunbar, one of them, J. Ponds, Somerset herald, was attacked by two men and assassinated. James, when he heard of this on his return, was in consternation. It might seriously aggravate the crisis which was already so alarming. Notwithstanding the painful state in which he then was, he wrote immediately to his uncle: ‘Be assured that punishment shall thereafter follow according to the quality of the crime, and that there is no prince now living who could be more afflicted than we are that such an odious crime should remain unpunished.’ He offered to send ambassadors and heralds to explain the criminal deed.[263] That was probably the last letter written by the king.
James had a painful interview with the cardinal, who might now understand to what a condition his hatred of the Reformation and his ambition had reduced the king and the realm. James, who believed himself pursued by a fatal destiny, took account sorrowfully, when left alone, of his treasures and his jewels; and then, full of shame and melancholy, and afraid to show himself to anyone whomsoever in his capital, set out secretly for Fifeshire. He stopped at Hallyards, where he was warmly received by the lady of Grange, a respectable and pious woman, whose husband was absent at the time. This Christian woman, observing at supper that the prince was plunged in melancholy, sought to comfort him, and exhorted him to bow with resignation to the will of God. ‘My portion of this world is short,’ sorrowfully answered James; ‘in fifteen days I shall be with you no more.’ Some time afterwards one of the officers of his court having said to him, ‘Sire, Christmas is nigh; where will your majesty wish to celebrate that festival?’ James replied with a scornful smile, ‘I cannot tell: choose ye the place. But this I can tell you, on Yule day ye will be masterless, and the realm without a king.’
LAST HOURS OF JAMES V.
Haunted by these thoughts, the king went thence to Carney castle, and next to his palace at Falkland, where he took to his bed. It would have been natural for him to go to Linlithgow, to his queen, who was on the point of giving birth to a child. He chose rather to be at a distance from her. Loose living is incompatible with domestic happiness. No symptom showed that his death was near. James, however, was always repeating the words, ‘Before such a day I shall be dead.’ His courtiers, astonished and afflicted, said to one another that if the queen gave him a son, the happiness so much desired would restore him; but on December 8, 1542, she gave birth to a girl—the celebrated Mary Stuart. On learning that the newborn infant was a girl, James, wounded afresh in his dearest wish, turned to the wall, away from those who had brought him the sad tidings. ‘The devil go with it,’ he said; ‘it will end as it began; it came with a lass, and it will go with a lass.’[264] He saw his family extinct, his crown lost. Other Stuarts, however, bore it after Mary. Both Scotland and England, unhappily, knew that to their cost. But this circumstance—the hope frustrated of a son to take the place of the two which he had lost—was a fresh and fatal blow for the unfortunate James:
De douleur en douleur il traversait la vie.
The cardinal presented himself at the castle. His visit was natural at that moment. But the ambitious prelate, supposing the king to be near death, came not to console him, but to secure his own position. As the king in his present dangerous state could only hear with difficulty, the primate cried in his ear—‘Take order, sir, with the realm. Who shall rule during the minority of your daughter? Ye have known my service; what will ye have done? Shall there not be four regents chosen, and shall not I be principal of them?’ The clever prelate succeeded in getting a document prepared which was in his favor. The king was sinking. But the memory of Solway ran continually in his head, and disturbed his last moments. ‘Fie,’ cried he; ‘fled is Oliver? is Oliver taken? All is lost.’ On December 14, 1542, at the age of thirty-two, six days after the birth of Mary Stuart, James V. died. When disrobing him, they found in his pocket the famous proscription list. What was to come of that now?
James was buried at Holyrood January 8, and the cardinal who had driven him along that fatal path in which he was to meet death presided at the ceremony. This prince, thus taken away in the flower of his age, died not so much of disease as of a broken heart.[265] ‘The sorrow of the world worketh death.’ He had understanding, but it was uncultivated; he was moderate in respect to the pleasures of the table, but he had been thrown in his youth into other irregularities, from which he never got free. He might be seen in the bitterest winter weather, on horseback night and day, endeavoring to surprise the freebooters in their retreats; and poor men had always easy access to him. But for want of thoughtfulness and solid principles he was incessantly tossed to and fro between the nobles and the priests, and whichever of these two was the most adroit easily took the upper hand. He sinned much, but perhaps he was still more ‘sinned against.’