"Spy!" taunted the other, and their ringing swords struck fire at every ward and cut. Kilmaurs received a severe wound on the bridle hand, and Shelly's helmet was nearly cloven in two, the vizor being struck completely off; but now other hands and weapons mingled in the combat, and here as in other portions of this extensive skirmish, the Scots were beaten, and had to fly at full speed to reach their own camp; but not until after the contest had been maintained for three hours, with the greatest valour and desperation; and until they had lost no less than thirteen hundred men and horses, did they entirely give way; and then the remnant were pursued round Fawside Hill for three miles to the right flank of the Scottish camp.
Fawside had his armour cut or riven in more than twenty places, by the long swords of the men-at-arms of Boulogne; and his fine grey charger, the gift of Mary of Lorraine, bore him through the Howemire and back to the camp, but so covered was it with wounds as to be disembowelled and dying.
Such was the result of this severe cavalry encounter, a prelude to the greater strife of the morrow; it filled the Scots with greater rancour, and the English (who knew that they must either win a battle or be driven into the sea) with a glow of triumph, which they were at no pains to conceal, for the livelong night their camp rang with rejoicing, and shouts of acclamation.
CHAPTER XLVI.
THE PARLEY.
Lo, I have ripen'd discord into war!
So let them now agree and form the league;
Since Trojan swords have spilt Ausonian blood;
The war stands sure; and hand to hand they've fought:
Such nuptial rites,—such Hymeneal feasts!
Æneid, viii.
After this conflict had been waged throughout the lower parts of the ground between the hostile camps, the Duke of Somerset, attended by Don Pedro de Gamboa, the Earl of Warwick, and others had ascended the steep green eminence of Inveresk, where, within the trenches of a Roman camp, stood the ancient church of St. Michael. From this lofty point, Somerset fully reconnoitred the position of the Scots; and he became more than ever convinced that any attempt to dislodge them would be attended with great loss, and perhaps by a total defeat. As he and his group of attendants were somewhat moodily descending the hill towards their own camp, they heard the sound of a trumpet issuing from a copsewood, and in a green lane which leads directly from St. Michael's Church towards the hill of Fawside, they were met, as we are told in history, by four Scotsmen. The first of these was a gentleman on horseback—Florence Fawside—in full armour except his head, on which he wore a blue velvet bonnet adorned by a tall white ostrich feather. He bore a steel gauntlet on his lance, and was attended by the Albany Herald in his tabard, the Ormond Pursuivant with his silver collar of SS around his neck, and by a trumpeter in the royal livery (red and yellow) who sharply blew the peculiar notes which invite a parley.
Florence had scarcely reached the Scottish camp, after the recent discomfiture of the Lord Home's mosstroopers, ere he was despatched to the English Protector, on a delicate mission by the Regent Arran and the Earl of Huntly.
"Well, Scots, what seek you?" asked Somerset, who was a stately man of a noble presence, with a fine open countenance, and a short-clipped beard, of the late King Henry's fashion. Over his armour, which was richly studded and inlaid with gold damasquinée, he wore an open cassock-coat of crimson velvet, lined with white ermine, and on his breast were the collar and order of the garter. Dudley Earl of Warwick was nearly dressed in the same fashion, and wore the same illustrious order. "Come you hither to offer me terms?" asked the duke.
"Such terms as your excellency may accept without dishonour," replied Fawside, bowing low, for in manner and bearing the noble Somerset looked every inch a prince, and indeed closely resembled his late monarch Henry VIII. in face, figure, and dress.