1310.

So great famine in Scotland that many persons fed on horse-flesh.3

1312.

Hugh Harding, an Englishman, challenged William de Seintlowe, a Scotsman, for bearing the coat armorial of Harding. To decide the controversy, they fought at Perth. William de Seintlowe was vanquished, and resigned the coat armorial, and the honour of the combat, to Hugh Harding, by open confession, in presence of Robert Bruce. The King, sitting on his throne, adjudged the coat armorial to Harding.*

ten volumes in folio, A. D. 1639; and that many treatises of his composition are still in MS.

"*

Robertus, Dei gratia, Rex Scotiae, omnibus ad quos praesentes literae pervenerint, salutem. Cum nos accepimus duellum apud nostram villam de Perthe, die confectionis praesentium, inter Hugonem Harding, Anglicum appellantem, de armis de Goules, tribus leporariis de auro colloree de B. et Willielmum de Seintlowe, Scotum appellatum, eisdem armis sine differentia indutos. Quo quidem duello percusso, praedictus Willielmus se finaliter reddidit devictum, et praedicto Hugoni remisit ac relaxavit, et omnino de se et haeredibus suis in perpetuum praedicta arma, cum toto triumpho, honore, et victoria, ore tenus in audientia nostra. Quare, nos in solio nostro tribunali regali sancti patris, cum magnatibus et dominio regni nostri personaliter sedentes, adjudicavimus et finaliter decretum dedimus, per praesentes, quòd praedictus Hugo Harding et haeredes sui, de caetero in perpetuum habeant et teneant, gaudeant et portent, praedicta arma integraliter, absque calumnia, perturbatione, contradictione, reclamatione, praedicti Willielmi seu haeredum suorum: In cujus rei testimonium, has literas nostras fieri fecimus patentes, apud dictam villam nostram de Perthe, secundo die Aprilis, anno regni nostri septimo, annoque Domini 1312."

"Diploma hoc, genere et studiis nobilissimi Sampsonis Erdeswick, de quo vide Camdenum, adversariis debemus ;" E. Bisse,

1314.

Five shillings supposed to be the value of a cow, and six shillings and eight pence, the value of an

ox.*

1327.

Fire-arms were first employed by the English in their wars with Scotland. Barbour calls them "crakys of war."s

Froissart thus describes the manner of living of the Scots during their military expeditions." "Their Knights and Esquires are well mounted on great coursers; the common sort and the country people ride little horses. They take no carriages with them, by reason of the unevenness of the ground among the hills of Northumberland, through which their road lies, neither do they make provision of bread or wine; for, such is their abstemiousness,

in N. Uptonum de studio militari; Notae, p. 34. Colloree de B. is obscure; perhaps it may signify, that the greyhounds had blue collars. In plain language, the coat armorial was, " three gold or yellow greyhounds, with (blue) collars, on a red field." Harding won it, and, by the decree of the King of Scots, wore it. This certificate is singular in its style; I do not affirm it to be anthentic, not having seen the original writing. Qu. Was this Hugh related to John Harding the forger?

* " Assedatio terrarum de Dunnethyn," by Bernard Abbot of Aberbrothock, to David de Maxwell" Et si dictus David amerciatus fuerit in curia Domini Abbatis, pro propria querela dabit pro amerciamento, quoties acciderit, quinque solidos, vel unam vaccam;" Ch. Aberbro. vol. ii. fol. 12. Bernard, the Abbot, became Bishop of Sodor in 1328. The delivery of four oxen by the Earls of Lennox, was commuted, in 1317, into a payment of two marks of silver. So that, at that time, it appears that the price of an ox was six shillings and eightpence. The deed containing this commutation is so cautiously conceived, that we may conclude the bargain to have been fair; Chart. Aberbroth. ibid.

that, in war, they are wont, for a considerable space of time, contentedly to eat flesh half dressed, without bread, and to drink river water, without wine: Neither have they any use for kettles and caldrons; for, after they have flead the cattle which they take, they have their own mode of dressing them." (This he elsewhere describes to be, by fixing the hide to four stakes, making it in the shape of a caldron, placing fire below, and so boiling the flesh). "They are sure of finding abundance of cattle in the country through which they mean to go, and therefore they make no farther provision. Every man carries about the saddle of his horse, a great flat plate, and he trusses behind him a wallet full of meal; the purpose of which is this: after a Scottish soldier has eaten flesh so long that he begins to loath it, he throws this plate into the fire, then moistens a little of his meal in water, and when the plate is once heated, he lays his paste upon it, and makes a little cake, which he eats to comfort his stomach. Hence we may see, that it is not strange that the Scots should be able to make longer marches than other men."*

* Here is a minute and long description of the method of baking bannocks on a girdle. Froissart says, " chacun emporte entre la selle de son cheval et le penon, une grande piece plate." Sauvage, the publisher of Froissart, annot. 39. confesses his ignorance of the sense of the word penon at this place. It probably implies crupper. As to the caldrons made of the hides of cattle, Sauvage says, annot. 41. " J'ay entendu de ceux qui disent avoir veu chose semblable en Escoce, que les Escosois, après avoir écorché les grosses bestes, attachent les peaux, par les pieds, à quatre fourchettes droites, fichées en terre: Telle

8

1329.

Thefts had become so frequent in Scotland, that husbandmen were obliged to house their ploughshares every night. Randolph, Regent in the minority of David II. ordered that all ploughshares should be left in the fields, and, if stolen, that the county should refund their value. A certain husbandman hid his ploughshare, and, pretending that it had been stolen, obtained its value* from the sheriff of the county. The cheat happened to be discovered, and the husbandman was hanged for theft.

1335.

Edward III. made a grant of the estate of Edrington near Berwick. This grant is remarkable; because it determines a controverted point in the history of the law of Scotland. It proves, that anciently salmon-fishings and mills were extended, that is, valued, for ascertaining the rate of public taxations,† &c.

ment qu'au milieu d'icelles peaux, ainsi suspendues, se fait un fond: dedans lequel ils mettent bouillir et cuire ce qu'ils veulent, sur feu moyen, et si bien temperé, que c'est tout s'il brule seulement le poil, qui est tourné vers lui."

* Fordun says, that the iron work of the plough was estimated at two shillings.

+ "Quae quidem villa (de Ederynton) piscaria (de Edermuth) et molendina (villae de Berewico) ad centum et septem libras, tres solidos, et septem denarios, tempore pacis, per dilectum clericum nostrum Thomam de Burgh, Camerarium nostrum de Berewico super Twedam, de mandato nostro extenduntur;" Foedera, T. iv. p. 670. Here also there is a new sense of the phrase tempore pacis, not implying any ancient valuation, but only the rate at which the subjects might be reasonably estimated in times of public tranquillity.

1

By a treaty of alliance between Edward Balliol and John Lord of the Isles, it was specially provided, that the Lord of the Isles should have right to stand godfather to any heir of Balliol's body.*

1336.

Alan of Winton forcibly carried off the young heiress of Seton.1o This produced a feud in Lothian, while some favoured the ravisher, and others sought to bring him to punishment. Fordun says, that on this occasion a hundred ploughs in Lothian were laid aside from labour.

Henry de Lancaster,† commander of the English forces, invited the Knight of Liddesdale to combat with him in the lists at Berwick. In the first course, the Knight of Liddesdale was wounded by the breaking of his own spear. This accident having interrupted the sport, Henry de Lancaster requested Alexander Ramsay to bring twenty gentlemen with him to encounter an equal number of English. The request was complied with, and the

*"Praeterea praefatus Dominus Rex vult et concedit, quòd quocunque tempore habeat haeredem de corpore suo legitimè procreatum, quòd compaternitas ejusdem haeredis praefato Johanni concedatur." In Du Cange, v. Compaternitas, it is said, Compaternitas, cognatio spiritualis quae inter compatres intercedit. Comperage Gallis. P. Damiani, L. ii. Epist. 17. duo quidam viri qui et amicitiae invicem foedere, et compaternitatis necessitudine, tenebantur. Thuroczius Reg. Hung. c. 66. apud quem aliquandiu commoratus compaternitatis vinculo Regi sociatur, vid. c. 1. et 3. de cognatione spirituali."

+ Fordun, L. xiii. c. 43. calls him Earl of Derby; but he did not obtain that title until 19th March 1337; Knyghton, p. 2568. The tournament at Berwick is placed at the only season in which it could have been celebrated during the truce int summer 1336.