A mother-naked man:
She wrapt him in her green mantle,
And sae her true love wan!"
A mile or two up the river from Carterhaugh, on Ettrick's right bank, stands the interesting and well-preserved old tower of Oakwood, the property of the Scotts of Harden, in whose possession it has been since 1517. Locally, the belief is implicitly held that this tower was, in the thirteenth century, the residence of the great Michael Scott, the Wizard, out of whose tomb in Melrose Abbey William of Deloraine took
"From the cold hand the Mighty Book,
With iron clasp'd, and with iron hound:
He thought as he took it the dead man frowned."
There was a Michael Scott who once owned Oakwood, but that was long after the Wizard's day. In spite of all tradition—for whose birth Sir Walter is probably responsible—it is not likely that the veritable Michael (Thomas the Rhymer's contemporary, and a Fifeshire man) ever was near Oakwood.
