The prophecy, put in the name of our Thomas the Rhymer, as it stands in Hart's book, refers to a later period. The narrator meets the Rhymer upon a land beside a lee, who shows him many emblematical visions, described in no mean strain of poetry. They chiefly relate to the fields of Flodden and Pinkie, to the national distress which followed these defeats, and to future halcyon days, which are promised to Scotland. One quotation or two will be sufficient to establish this fully:
Our Scottish king sal come ful keene,
The red lyon beareth he;
A feddered arrow sharp, I weene,
Shall make him winke and warre to see.
Out of the field he shall be led,
When he is bludie and woe for blood;
Yet to his men shall he say,
"For God's luve, turn you againe,
"And give yon sutherne folk a frey!
"Why should I lose the right is mine?
"My date is not to die this day."—
Who can doubt, for a moment, that this refers to the battle of Flodden, and to the popular reports concerning the doubtful fate of James IV.? Allusion is immediately afterwards made to the death of George Douglas, heir apparent of Angus, who fought and fell with his sovereign:
The sternes three that day shall die,
That bears the harte in silver sheen.
The well-known arms of the Douglas family are the heart and three stars. In another place, the battle of Pinkie is expressly mentioned by name:
At Pinken Cluch there shall be spilt,
Much gentle blood that day;
There shall the bear lose the guilt,
And the eagill bear it away.
To the end of all this allegorical and mystical rhapsody, is interpolated, in the later edition by Andro Hart, a new edition of Berlington's verses, before quoted, altered and manufactured so as to bear reference to the accession of James VI., which had just then taken place. The insertion is made with a peculiar degree of awkwardness, betwixt a question, put by the narrator, concerning the name and abode of the person who shewed him these strange matters, and the answer of the prophet to that question:
"Then to the Bairne could I say,
"Where dwells thou, or in what countrie?
"[Or who shall rule the isle of Britane,
"From the north to the south sey?
"A French queene shall beare the sonne,
"Shall rule all Britaine to the sea;
"Which of the Bruce's blood shall come,
"As neere as the nint degree:
"I frained fast what was his name,
"Where that he came, from what country.]
"In Erslingtoun I dwell at hame,
"Thomas Rymour men cals me."
There is surely no one, who will not conclude, with Lord Hailes, that the eight lines, inclosed in brackets, are a clumsy interpolation, borrowed from Berlington, with such alterations as might render the supposed prophecy applicable to the union of the crowns.
While we are on this subject, it may be proper briefly to notice the scope of some of the other predictions, in Hart's Collection. As the prophecy of Berlington was intended to raise the spirits of the nation, during the regency of Albany, so those of Sybilla and Eltraine refer to that of the Earl of Arran, afterwards Duke of Chatelherault, during the minority of Mary, a period of similar calamity. This is obvious from the following verses: