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Marmion
See the whole in Sibbald’s Collection, vol. i. p. 234.’-SCOTT.
Since Scott’s time Dunbar’s poems have been edited, with perfect scholarship and skill, by David Laing (2 vols. post 8vo. 1824), and by John Small (in l885) for the Scottish Text Society. See Dict. of Nat. Biog.
lines 254-9. This perfect description may be compared, for accuracy of observation and dexterous presentment, with the steed in ‘Venus and Adonis,’ the paragon of horses in English verse. Both writers give ample evidence of direct personal knowledge.
Stanza X. line 261. ‘It has been already noticed [see note to stanza xiii. of Canto I.] that King James’s acquaintance with Lady Heron of Ford did not commence until he marched into England. Our historians impute to the King’s infatuated passion the delays which led to the fatal defeat of Flodden. The author of “The Genealogy of the Heron Family” endeavours, with laudable anxiety, to clear the Lady Ford from this scandal; that she came and went, however, between the armies of James and Surrey, is certain. See PINKERTON’S History, and the authorities he refers to, vol. ii. p. 99. Heron of Ford had been, in 1511, in some sort accessory to the slaughter of Sir Robert Kerr of Cessford, Warden of the Middle Marches. It was committed by his brother the bastard, Lilburn, and Starked, three Borderers. Lilburn and Heron of Ford were delivered up by Henry to James, and were imprisoned in the fortress of Fastcastle, where the former died. Part of the pretence of Lady Ford’s negotiations with James was the liberty of her husband.’-SCOTT.
line 271. love = beloved. Cp. Burns’s ‘O my love is like a red red rose.’
line 273. ‘“Also the Queen of France wrote a love-letter to the King of Scotland, calling him her love, showing him that she had suffered much rebuke in France for the defending of his honour. She believed surely that he would recompense her again with some of his kingly support in her necessity; that is to say, that he would raise her an army, and come three foot of ground on English ground, for her sake. To that effect she sent him a ring off her finger, with fourteen thousand French crowns to pay bis expenses.” PITSCOTTIE, p.110. – A turquois ring-probably this fatal gift-is, with James’s sword and dagger, preserved in the College of Heralds, London.’-SCOTT.
lines 287-8. The change of movement introduced by this couplet has the intended effect of arresting the attention and lending pathos to the description and sentiment.
Stanza XI. line 302. The wimple was a covering for the neck, said to have been introduced in the reign of Edward I. See Chaucer’s ‘Prologue,’ 151: -
‘Ful semely hire wympel i-pynched was.’line 307. Cp. 2 Henry IV, iii. 2. 9, ‘By yea and nay, sir.’
line 308. Cp. refrain of song, ‘‘Twas within a mile o’ Edinburgh Town,’ in Johnson’s Museum: -
‘The lassie blush’d, and frowning cried, “No, no, it will not do; I cannot, cannot, wonnot, wonnot, mannot buckle too.”‘Stanza XII. The skilful application of the anapaest for the production of the brilliant gallop of ‘Lochinvar’ has been equalled only by Scott himself in his ‘Bonnets o’ Bonnie Dundee.’ Cp. Lord Tennyson’s ‘Northern Farmer’ (specially New Style), and Mr. Browning’s ‘How they brought the Good News from Ghent to Aix.’ ‘The ballad of Lochinvar,’ says Scott, ‘is in a very slight degree founded on a ballad called “ Katharine Janfarie,” which may be found in the “Minstrelsy of the Scottish Border,” vol. ii. Mr. Charles Gibbon’s ‘Laird o’ Lamington’ is based on the same legend.
line 332. ‘See the novel of “Redgauntlet” for a detailed picture of some of the extraordinary phenomena of the spring-tides in the Solway Frith.’-LOCKHART.
line 344. galliard (Sp. gallarda, Fr. gaillarda), a lively dance. Cp. Henry V, i. 2, 252, ‘a nimble galliard,’ and note on expression in Clarendon Press ed.
line 353. scaur, cliff or river bank. Cp. Blackie’s ‘Ascent of Cruachan’ in ‘Lays of the Highlands and Islands,’ p. 98: -
‘Scale the scaur that gleams so red.’Stanza XIII. line 376. Cp. Dryden’s ‘Aurengzebe’:
‘Love and a crown no rivalship can bear.’line 382. Sir R. Kerr. See above, line 261.
line 383. Andrew Barton, High Admiral of Scotland, was one of a family of seamen, to whom James IV granted letters of reprisal against Portuguese traders for the violent death of their father. Both the King and the Bartons profited much by their successes. At length the Earl of Surrey, accusing Andrew Barton of attacking English as well as Portuguese vessels, sent two powerful men-of-war against him, and a sharp battle, fought in the Downs, resulted in Barton’s death and the capture of his vessels. See Chambers’s ‘Eminent Scotsmen,’ vol. v.
line 386. James sent his herald to Henry before Terouenne, calling upon him to desist from hostilities against Scotland’s ally, the king of France, and sternly reminding him of the various insults to which Henry’s supercilious policy had subjected him. Flodden had been fought before the messenger returned with his answer. Barclay a contemporary poet, had written about seven years earlier, in his ‘Ship of Fooles’: -
‘If the Englishe Lion his wisedome and riches Conjoyne with true love, peace, and fidelitie With the Scottishe Unicornes might and hardines, There is no doubt but all whole Christentie Shall live in peace, wealth, and tranquilitie.’But such a desirable consummation was to wait yet a while.
Stanza XIV. line 398. ‘Archibald Douglas, Earl of Angus,’ says Scott, ‘a man remarkable for strength of body and mind, acquired the popular name of Bell-the-Cat, upon the following remarkable occasion: – James the Third, of whom Pitscottie complains that he delighted more in music, and “policies of building,” than in hunting, hawking, and other noble exercises, was so ill advised as to make favourites of his architects and musicians, whom the same historian irreverently terms masons and fiddlers. His nobility, who did not sympathise in the King’s respect for the fine arts, were extremely incensed at the honours conferred on those persons, particularly on Cochrane, a mason, who had been created Earl of Mar; and, seizing the opportunity, when, in 1482, the King had convoked the whole array of the country to march against the English, they held a midnight council in the church of Lauder, for the purpose of forcibly removing these minions from the King’s person. When all had agreed on the propriety of this measure, Lord Gray told the assembly the apologue of the Mice, who had formed a resolution, that it would be highly advantageous to their community to tie a bell round the cat’s neck, that they might hear her approach at a distance; but which public measure unfortunately miscarried, from no mouse being willing to undertake the task of fastening the bell. “I understand the moral,” said Angus, “and, that what we propose may not lack execution, I will bell the cat.”‘
The rest of the strange scene is thus told by Pitscottie: -
‘By this was advised and spoken by thir lords foresaid, Cochran, the Earl of Mar, came from the King to the council, (which council was holden in the kirk of Lauder for the time,) who was well accompanied with a band of men of war; to the number of three hundred light axes, all clad in white livery, and black bends thereon, that they might be known for Cochran the Earl of Mar’s men. Himself was clad in a riding-pie of black velvet, with a great chain of gold about his neck, to the value of five hundred crowns, and four blowing horns, with both the ends of gold and silk, set with a precious stone, called a berryl, hanging in the midst. This Cochran had his heumont born before him, overgilt with gold, and so were all the rest of his horns, and all his pallions were of fine canvas of silk, and the cords thereof fine twined silk, and the chains upon his pallions were double overgilt with gold.
‘This Cochran was so proud in his conceit, that he counted no lords to be marrows to him, therefore he rushed rudely at the kirk-door. The council inquired who it was that perturbed them at that time. Sir Robert Douglas, Laird of Lochleven, was keeper of the kirk-door at that time, who inquired who that was that knocked so rudely; and Cochran answered, “This is I, the Earl of Mar.” The which news pleased well the lords, because they were ready boun to cause take him, as is before rehearsed. Then the Earl of Angus past hastily to the door, and with him Sir Robert Douglas of Lochleven, there to receive in the Earl of Mar, and go many of his complices who were there, as they thought good. And the Earl of Angus met with the Earl of Mar, as he came in at the door, and pulled the golden chain from his craig, and said to him, a tow1 would set him better. Sir Robert Douglas syne pulled the blowing horn from him in like manner, and said, “He had been the hunter of mischief over long.” This Cochran asked, “My lords, is it mows2, or earnest?” They answered, and said, “It is good earnest, and so thou shalt find; for thou and thy complices have abused our prince this long time; of whom thou shalt hare no more credence, but shalt have thy reward according to thy good service, as thou hast deserved in times bypast; right so the rest of thy followers.”
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1rope. 2jest.
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‘Notwithstanding, the lords held them quiet till they caused certain armed men to pass into the King’s pallion, and two or three wise men to pass with them, and give the King fair pleasant words, till they laid hands on all the King’s servants and took them and hanged them before his eyes over the bridge of Lawder. Incontinent they brought forth Cochran, and his hands bound with a tow, who desired them to take one of his own pallion tows and bind his hands, for he thought shame to have his hands bound with such tow of hemp, like a thief. The lords answered, he was a traitor, he deserved no better; and, for despight, they took a hair tether3, and hanged him over the bridge of Lawder, above the rest of his complices.’-PITSCOTTIE, p. 78, folio edit.
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3halter.
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line 400. Hermitage Castle is on Hermitage water, which falls into the Liddell. The ruins still exist.
line 402. Bothwell Castle is on the right bank of the Clyde, a few miles above Glasgow. While staying there in 1799 Scott began a ballad entitled ‘Bothwell Castle,’ which remains a fragment. Lockhart gave it in the ‘Life,’ i. 305, ed. 1837. There, as here, he makes reference to the touching legendary ballad, ‘Bothwell bank thou bloomest fair,’ which a traveller before 1605 heard a woman singing in Palestine.
line 406. Reference to Cicero’s cedant arma togae, a relic of an attempt at verse.
line 414. ‘Angus was an old man when the war against England was resolved upon. He earnestly spoke against that measure from its commencement; and, on the eve of the battle of Flodden, remonstrated so freely upon the impolicy of fighting, that the King said to him, with scorn and indignation, “if he was afraid, he might go home.” The Earl burst into tears at this insupportable insult, and retired accordingly, leaving his sons, George, Master of Angus, and Sir William of Glenbervie, to command his followers. They were both slain in the battle, with two hundred gentlemen of the name of Douglas. The aged Earl, broken-hearted at the calamities of his house and his country, retired into a religious house, where he died about a year after the field of Flodden.’-SCOTT.
Stanza XV. lines 415-20. Cp. description of Sir H. Osbaldistone, ‘Rob Roy,’ chap. vi.
line 429. ‘The ruins of Tantallon Castle occupy a high rock projecting into the German Ocean, about two miles east of North Berwick. The building is not seen till a close approach, as there is rising ground betwixt it and the land. The circuit is of large extent, fenced upon three sides by the precipice which overhangs the sea, and on the fourth by a double ditch and very strong outworks. Tantallon was a principal castle of the Douglas family, and when the Earl of Angus was banished, in 1527, it continued to hold out against James V. The King went in person against it, and for its reduction, borrowed from the Castle of Dunbar, then belonging to the Duke of Albany, two great cannons, whose names, as Pitscottie informs us with laudable minuteness, were “Thrawn mouth’d Meg and her Marrow”; also, “two great botcards, and two moyan, two double falcons, and four quarter falcons”; for the safe guiding and re-delivery of which, three lords were laid in pawn at Dunbar. Yet, notwithstanding all this apparatus, James was forced to raise the siege, and only afterwards obtained possession of Tantallon by treaty with the governor, Simon Panango, When the Earl of Angus returned from banishment, upon the death of James, he again obtained possession of Tantallon, and it actually afforded refuge to an English ambassador, under circumstances similar to those described in the text. This was no other than the celebrated Sir Ralph Sadler, who resided there for some time under Angus’s protection, after the failure of his negotiation for matching the infant Mary with Edward VI. He says, that though this place was poorly furnished, it was of such strength as might warrant him against the malice of his enemies, and that he now thought himself out of danger. (His State papers were published in 1810, with certain notes by Scott.)
‘There is a military tradition, that the old Scottish March was meant to express the words,
“Ding down Tantallon, Mak a brig to the Bass.”‘Tantallon was at length “dung down” and ruined by the Covenanters; its lord, the Marquis of Douglas, being a favourer of the royal cause. The castle and barony were sold in the beginning of the eighteenth century to President Dalrymple of North Berwick, by the then Marquis of Douglas.’-SCOTT.
In 1888, under the direction of Mr. Walter Dalrymple, son of the proprietor, certain closed staircases in the ruins were opened, and various excavations were made, with the purpose of discovering as fully as possible what the original character of the structure had been. These operations have added greatly to the interest of the ruin, which both by position and aspect is one of the most imposing in the country.
line 432. ‘A very ancient sword, in possession of Lord Douglas, bears, among a great deal of flourishing, two hands pointing to a heart which is placed betwixt them, and the date 1329, being the year in which Bruce charged the Good Lord Douglas to carry his heart to the Holy Land. The following lines (the first couplet of which is quoted by Godscroft, as a popular saying in his time) are inscribed around the emblem: -
“So mony guid as of ye Dovglas beinge, Of ane surname was ne’er in Scotland seine. I will ye charge, efter yat I depart, To holy grawe, and thair bury my hart; Let it remane ever BOTHE TYME AND HOWR, To ye last day I sie my Saviour. I do protest in tyme of al my ringe, Ye lyk subject had never ony keing.”‘This curious and valuable relic was nearly lost during the Civil War of 1745-6, being carried away from Douglas Castle by some of those in arms for Prince Charles. But great interest having been made by the Duke of Douglas among the chief partisans of the Stuart, it was at length restored. It resembles a Highland claymore, of the usual size, is of an excellent temper, and admirably poised.’-SCOTT.
Stanza XVI. line 461. Scott quotes: -
‘O Dowglas! Dowglas Tender and trew.’-The Houlate.line 470. There are two famous sparrows in literature, the one Lesbia’s sparrow, tenderly lamented by Catullus, and the other Jane Scrope’s sparrow, memorialised by Skelton in the ‘ Boke of Phyllyp Sparowe.’
line 475. The tears of such as Douglas are of the kind mentioned in Cowley’s ‘Prophet,’ line 20: -
‘Words that weep, and tears that speak.’Stanza XVII. line 501. ‘The ancient cry to make room for a dance or pageant.’-SCOTT.
Cp. Romeo and Juliet, i. 5. 28: ‘A hall! a hall! give room,’ &c.
line 505. The tune is significant of a Scottish invasion of England. See Scott’s appropriate song to the ‘ancient air,’ ‘Monastery,’ xxv. Reference is made in I Henry II, ii. 4. 368, to the head-dress of the Scottish soldiers, when Falstaff informs Prince Hal that Douglas is in England, ‘and a thousand blue-caps more.’
Stanza XIX. line 545. Many of the houses in Old Edinburgh are built to a great height, so that the common stairs leading up among a group of them have sometimes been called ‘perpendicular streets.’ Pitch, meaning ‘height,’ is taken from hawking, the height to which a bird rose depending largely on the pitch given it.
Stanza XX. line 558. St. Giles’s massive steeple is one of the features of Edinburgh. The ancient church, recently renovated by the munificence of the late William Chambers, is now one of the most imposing Presbyterian places of worship in Scotland.
line 569. For bowne see above, IV. 487.
line 571. A certain impressiveness is given by the sudden introduction of this pentameter.
Stanza XXI. Jeffrey, in reviewing’ Marmion, ‘fixed on this narrative of the Abbess as a passage marked by ‘flatness and tediousness,’ and could see in it ‘no sort of beauty nor elegance of diction.’ The answer to such criticism is that the narrative is direct and practical, and admirably suited to its purpose.
line 585. Despiteously, despitefully. ‘Despiteous’ is used in ‘Lay of the Last Minstrel,’ V. xix. Cp. Chaucer’s ‘Man of Lawe,’ 605 (Clarendon Press ed.): -
‘And sey his wyf despitously yslayn.’line 587. ‘A German general, who commanded the auxiliaries sent by the Duchess of Burgundy with Lambert Simnel. He was defeated and killed at Stokefield. The name of this German general is preserved by that of the field of battle, which is called, after him, Swart-moor. – There were songs about him long current in England. See Dissertation prefixed to RITSON’S Ancient Songs, 1792, p. lxi.’-SCOTT.
line 588. Lambert Simnel, the Pretender, made a scullion after his overthrow by Henry VII.
line 590. Stokefield (Stoke, near Newark, county Nottingham) was fought 16 June, 1487.
line 607. ‘It was early necessary for those who felt themselves obliged to believe in the divine judgment being enunciated in the trial by duel, to find salvos for the strange and obviously precarious chances of the combat. Various curious evasive shifts, used by those who took up an unrighteous quarrel, were supposed sufficient to convert it into a just one. Thus, in the romance of “Amys and Amelion,” the one brother-in-arms, fighting for the other, disguised in his armour, swears that he did not commit the crime of which the Steward, his antagonist, truly, though maliciously, accused him whom he represented. Brantome tells a story of an Italian, who entered the lists upon an unjust quarrel, but, to make his cause good, fled from his enemy at the first onset. “Turn, coward!” exclaimed his antagonist. “Thou liest,” said the Italian, “coward am I none; and in this quarrel will I fight to the death, but my first cause of combat was unjust, and I abandon it.” “Je vous laisse a penser,” adds Brantome, “s’il n’y a pas de l’abus la.” Elsewhere he says, very sensibly, upon the confidence which those who had a righteous cause entertained of victory: “Un autre abus y avoit-il, que ceux qui avoient un juste subjet de querelle, et qu’on les faisoit jurer avant entrer au camp, pensoient estre aussitost vainqueurs, voire s’en assuroient-t-ils du tout, mesmes que leurs confesseurs, parrains et confidants leurs en respondoient tout-a-fait, comme si Dieu leur en eust donne une patente; et ne regardant point a d’autres fautes passes, et que Dieu en garde la punition a ce coup la pour plus grande, despiteuse, et exemplaire.”-Discours sur le Duels.’-SCOTT.
Stanza XXII. line 612. Recreant, a coward, a disgraced knight. See ‘Lady of the Lake,’ V. xvi: -
‘Let recreant yield who fears to die’;and cp. ‘caitiff recreant,’ Richard II, i. 2. 53.
line 633. The Tame falls into the Trent above Tamworth.
Stanza XXIII. line 662. Quaint, neat, pretty, as in Much Ado, iii. 4. 21: ‘A fine, quaint, graceful, and excellent fashion.’
Stanza XXIV. line 704. St. Withold, St. Vitalis. Cp. King Lear, iii. 4. III. Clarendon Press ed., and note. This saint was invoked in nightmare.
Stanza XXV. line 717. Malison, curse.
line 717. ‘The Cross of Edinburgh was an ancient and curious structure. The lower part was an octagonal tower, sixteen feet in diameter, and about fifteen feet high. At each angle there was a pillar, and between them an arch, of the Grecian shape. Above these was a projecting battlement, with a turret at each corner, and medallions, of rude but curious workmanship, between them. Above this rose the proper Cross, a column of one stone, upwards of twenty feet high, surmounted with a unicorn. This pillar is preserved in the grounds of the property of Drum, near Edinburgh. The Magistrates of Edinburgh, in 1756, with consent of the Lords of Session, (proh pudor!) destroyed this curious monument, under a wanton pretext that it encumbered the street; while, on the one hand, they left an ugly mass called the Luckenbooths, and, on the other, an awkward, long, and low guard-house, which were fifty times more encumbrance than the venerable and inoffensive Cross.
‘From the tower of the Cross, so long as it remained, the heralds published the acts of Parliament; and its site, marked by radii, diverging from a stone centre, in the High Street, is still the place where proclamations are made.’-SCOTT.
See Fergusson’s ‘Plainstanes,’ Poems, p. 48. The Cross was restored by Mr. Gladstone in 1885, to commemorate his connexion with Midlothian as its parliamentary representative.
line 735. ‘This supernatural citation is mentioned by all our Scottish historians. It was, probably, like the apparition at Linlithgow, an attempt, by those averse to the war, to impose upon the superstitious temper of James IV. The following account from Pitscottie is characteristically minute, and furnishes, besides, some curious particulars of the equipment of the army of James IV. I need only add to it, that Plotcock, or Plutock, is no other than Pluto. The Christians of the middle ages by no means disbelieved in the existence of the heathen deities; they only considered them as devils, and Plotcock, so far from implying any thing fabulous, was a synonyme of the grand enemy of mankind.” 2 “Yet all thir warnings, and uncouth tidings, nor no good counsel, might stop the King, at this present, from his vain purpose, and wicked enterprize, but hasted him fast to Edinburgh, and there to make his provision and famishing, in having forth of his army against the day appointed, that they should meet in the Barrow-muir of Edinburgh: That is to say, seven cannons that he had forth of the Castle of Edinburgh, which were called the Seven Sisters, casten by Robert Borthwick, the master-gunner, with other small artillery, bullet, powder, and all manner of order, as the master-gunner could devise.
‘“In this meantime, when they were taking forth their artillery, and the King being in the Abbey for the time, there was a cry heard at the Market-cross of Edinburgh at the hour of midnight, proclaiming as it had been a summons, which was named and called by the proclaimer thereof, the summons of Plotcock; which desired all men to compear, both Earl, and Lord, and Baron, and all honest gentlemen within the town, (every man specified by his own name,) to compear, within the space of forty days, before his master, where it should happen him to appoint, and be for the time, under the pain of disobedience. But whether this summons was proclaimed by vain persons, night-walkers, or drunken men, for their pastime, or if it was a spirit, I cannot tell truly: but it was shewn to me, that an indweller of the town, Mr. Richard Lawson, being evil disposed, ganging in his gallery-stair foreanent the Cross, hearing this voice proclaiming this summons, thought marvel what it should be, cried on his servant to bring him his purse; and when he had brought him it, he took out a crown, and cast over the stair, saying, ‘I appeal from that summons, judgment, and sentence thereof, and take me all whole in the mercy of God, and Christ Jesus his son.’ Verily, the author of this, that caused me write the manner of this summons, was a landed gentleman, who was at that time twenty years of age, and was in the town the time of the said summons; and thereafter, when the field was stricken, he swore to me, there was no man that escaped that was called in this summons, but that one man alone which made his protestation, and appealed from the said summons: but all the lave were perished in the field with the king.”‘
