Yet turn ye to the eastern hand,
And wae and wonder ye shall see;
How thirty thousand Scotsmen stand,
Where yon rank river meets the sea.
There shall the lyon lose the gylte,
And the leopards hear it clean away;
At Pinkycleuch there shall be spylte
Much gentil blood that day.
Thomas the Rhymer.
The dawn of the next day, the 10th of September, 1547—by the Scots called, the Feast of St. Finian, by the English and others the Festival of St. Nicholas of Tolentino—was singularly beautiful. When the sun arose from his bed beyond the eastern sea, the waves rolled and glittered in amber light; the spray seemed to rise and fall in showers of snow and diamonds upon the rocky bluffs; while the dew of the past night lay heavy on every leaf and shrub. Between its green and far-stretching shores of yellow sand and opening bays, of mountain slopes and brown basaltic rocks, its grassy isles and covered headlands, the Forth lay almost waveless like a sea of gold, and receding far away as the eye could reach, until it melted into the eastern horizon, where cloud and wave were blent together.
The fertile hills and upheaved bluffs of Fife were tinted by the glory of the morning with saffron and purple, though mellowed by haze and distance; while the capital, with its castle, its steep ridge of towering mansions, St. Giles's tower, and Arthur's rocky cone, stood clearly forth from the deep unbroken blue of the west. As the sun rose higher, seeming to mount into heaven, through successive bars or horizontal lines of vapour, which turned to glowing gold and purple, the beauty of the morning increased, for it exhibited one of those glorious arrangements of massive cloud and blazing sunshine, brilliant light and sudden shadow, peculiar to the lowlands of Scotland.
Cleared of the grain, which was now stowed away in the vaults of baronial towers or of fortified granges, or else consumed by the flame and the troop-horses of the foe, the fields were bare now, and yellow stubble covered all the upland slopes, from the margin of the sea to the lonely Lammermuirs. In some places, the plough that lay now rusting and disused, had already been at work, and had turned up the long, brown furrows, above which the ravening gled and the black corbie, as if scenting the battle from afar, were wheeling in lazy circles. Westward, beyond the Esk, the stackyards were full of yellow grain, and along the river's bank, and among the old coppice that shrouded Pinkey House, Wallyford, and the Templar Hospital of St. Germains, the leaves were assuming those varied tints of orange, russet, green, and brown—the beautiful, but fading hues of the Scottish forests in autumn.
Such was the aspect of the morning and the scenery, when, on this Saturday in September, 1547, Florence Fawside reined up his horse on the slope of Inveresk Hill, and saw before him the whole arena of a battle-field; whereon manoeuvred the far-extended and glittering lines of more than fifty thousand Scots and Englishmen, prepared for mortal strife! And this was to gratify the mad ambition, of Henry VIII., who, from his deathbed bequeathed, like the first Edward, to his successors, the hopeless task of attempting to humble a free and warlike people.
The English had first begun to move about dawn, by sending some of their artillery to the summit of Inveresk and to Crookstone Loan, from whence they could play upon the camp of the Scots, towards whom their whole force moved in three great columns, Warwick still leading the van; Somerset led the second column, and Lord Dacres the third, or rear-guard; but on coming into the fertile plain, amid which the little stream named Pinkey Burn, flows through a cleuch or hollow, the English were astonished to find that the Scots, with singular imprudence, had accepted the duke's challenge, and left their strong position, to meet his better-trained and well-appointed army in the open field.
The regent of Scotland had unwisely mistaken the first movements of the English for an intention to seek safety in flight, by a precipitate retreat from the sands of Musselburgh on board their fleet. Alarmed lest they should thus escape, after their unwarrantable hostilities, and the devastations committed on their northern march, he resolved at once to cross the Esk, and get between them and their shipping, so as to cut off all chance of their retiring towards the sea. This movement he resolved to execute in defiance of the advice of the most wary and skilful soldiers in his army, which was armed almost entirely in the fashion of the middle ages, with lances, bows, swords, and battle-axes; while the English had many of the more modern appliances of warfare in the hands of their well-trained and veteran bands of Spaniards, Germans, and the garrisons of Calais and Boulogne, all of whom carried arquebuses or hand-guns.
The Earls of Arran, Huntly, Angus, and Argyle, on this day appeared each at the head of his division, sheathed in full armour, wearing above their cuirasses the Order of the Thistle, together with the Collar of St. Michael, which they had received from Francis I., two years before. Each wore around his helmet an earl's coronet, from the centre of which, beneath a plume of feathers, rose his gilded crest; thus, the first carried an oak-tree; the second, a stag's-head; the third, a salamander vert amid flames of fire; and the fourth, the wild boar's head of the Campbells, showing its ghastly tusks above his polished vizor.
"Reflect, lord regent," said the Earl of Huntly; "I pray you to reflect on this measure."
"Reflect on what?" asked Arran sharply, through his golden helmet.
"The sequel of a movement so rash as this."
"A brave soldier never reflects," replied Arran proudly.
"But a skilful captain doth," was the pointed response.
"True, my Lord Huntly," said the Earl of Angus; "you are in the right, and our friend Arran is most unwise to reject such prudent counsel."
"Enough, sirs—enough!" said Arran, who was burning with impatience, as he saw the long lines of the English glittering in the sunshine, and a longing for vengeance on Somerset, whose invasion had convulsed the realm, and whose plots, spies, assassins, and bribes, had so long disturbed the Scottish government, gathered in his heart; "let us attack them ere they escape by sea. You smile, my Lord Kilmaurs!" he added, turning wrathfully to that young lord.
"Nay, my lord regent—this is no time to smile; nor did I," replied the other bluntly.
"Methought a strange expression crossed your face."
Kilmaurs grew pale with rage, for being in the English interest, he had felt some satisfaction on foreseeing the ruin of Arran's army.
"Your grace is scarcely well bred in reproaching me with a wound received in the service of my country," said he, pointing to the scar which traversed his cheek, and the spasmodic twitching of which was a constant source of annoyance to him. He then put spurs to his horse and galloped to the head of his father's vassals, all stout yeomen of Cunninghame and Kyle, who were arrayed in a dense and steely mass under the banner with the hayfork sable, and were preparing to cross the fatal river at a ford.
The rash movement of Arran was urged by the Earl of Glencairn and many others, who are now known to have been the pensioners of England, and in secret league with Somerset; but dearly did it cost the earl and his Cunninghames.
"The lord regent is right," said he; "let us down at one fell swoop upon them; for what is yonder host but a banded horde of English clowns and Irish kerne—of Spanish robbers and German boors, come hither in steel bonnets to seek for blood and beer? Down at once, I say, and bear me this horde of invaders at spear-point to the sea!"
"But the German infantry," said Huntly, "and those arquebuses of Spain——"
"A rabble of tawny loons clad in armour so heavy, and mounted on horses so gorgeously trapped, that they can never escape your Highlandmen or the Lord Home's light Border-prickers."
The Earl of Angus now refused to advance, swearing "by St. Bryde of Douglas it was rank madness to cast advantage at their horses' heels."
"On pain of treason to our lady the queen, I charge you, lord earl, to pass forward with the van, or beware our speedy vengeance!" said Arran.
"My fear is less of thee than for my queen and country," replied the Douglas calmly, as he led his squadron girdle-deep through the stream, which swept some of them through the arches of the bridge, and away into the sea beyond.
"What says your leal and right-hand man, the young Laird of Fawside?" asked the Earl of Cassilis with a scarcely perceptible sneer; "doubtless that he is ready, on either side of the Esk, to die for your grace and the queen."
"To say so, my lord, were an empty boast," replied Florence quietly (his heart was too heavy for anger). "In yonder plain are six-and-thirty thousand Scots, who far excel me, I hope, in their readiness to die."
"To battle, then!" exclaimed Arran, waving his truncheon. "God and St. Andrew are with us!"
By this time the whole Scottish army had defiled across the high Roman bridge of Esk, and formed in dense columns of horse, foot, and archers, as they advanced towards the foe, presenting a splendid array, with all their polished helmets and cuirasses shining in the sun—their many square, triangular, and swallow-tailed banners waving, and their tall, uplifted lances, eighteen feet in length, and not less than fifteen thousand in number, swaying heavily to and fro, like a field of giant corn, as the close ranks marched on shoulder to shoulder, until the whole thirty-six thousand men stood in firm order of battle on the plain beyond the hill of Inveresk, which overlooked their left flank, while the green upland slope of Fawside rose upon their right.
With the shrill fife, the rattling drum (or Almainie swesche, as the Scots named it), the droning bagpipe, the twanging bugle-horn, the kettle, the clashing cymbal, and the sharp brass trumpet, filling the air with harsh but martial music, the Scottish lines drew near the English; and then the shouts, the cheers, the war-cries (the slogan of the Lowlanders, the cathghairm of the Celts), by which the soldiers of hastily-collected levies usually encourage each other, or taunt the foe, began to load the air with a confusion of sounds, after the deep boom of the first English cannon from the green brow of Inveresk had pealed through the clear welkin, and made a ghastly lane amid the nearest close column of Scottish infantry, causing the silken banners to rustle, the ranks to swerve, and the tall ash spears to sway like a corn-field bending beneath a blast of wind; and then to heaven went up a louder and a deeper shout, as the ranks closed over the mangled dead, and the forward march went on.
The centre was led by the Regent Arran in person. It consisted of the hardy clans from Stathearn, with the flower of the Scottish infantry, the men of Lothian, of Kinross, and of Stirlingshire. With many barons, he had also at least eight hundred chosen citizens of Edinburgh, led by William Craik, their provost. In their centre, Dick Hackerston bore the "Blue Blanket," or ancient banner of the city—a great swallow-tailed pennon of azure silk, worked for the burgesses by Margaret of Oldenburg. Among the men of Strathearn were the MacNabs, in their red, glaring tartans; and amid them were twelve stately warriors, conspicuous in their long lurichs of steel. These were Ian Mion and his eleven brothers, the heroes of the savage story of Lochearn, and on their banner was painted a human head affrontée.
The right wing consisted of six thousand western Highlanders, and brave and hardy islesmen, inured to battle and to storm, under MacLeod, MacGregor, and Archibald Earl of Argyle, the regent's son-in-law. On both its flanks and rear this column was covered by artillery. The other divisions presented the aspect either of dull or uniform masses covered with shining steel or brown leather; but this displayed the varied tartans of many Celtic tribes; and from its marching masses, with the incessant brandishing of swords and round targets, rose the wildest and most tumultuary shouts and outcries.
The left division of the Scots consisted of ten thousand infantry of Fife, Mearn, and the eastern counties, led by Archibald Earl of Angus, flanked by culverins and light horse. In their centre there marched a singular force, consisting of more than a thousand Scottish monks, who had been drawn from their cloisters by a terror of the Reformation (which Henry had so roughly established in England) being spread into Scotland, if Somerset's expedition proved successful. They were clad in plain black armour, and wore white or grey surcoats with crosses on the breast and back, to distinguish them as Dominicans, Cistercians, or Franciscans; and in their centre waved a white silk banner, which had been consecrated with many solemn ceremonies by the abbot of Dunfermline, after it had been made by Mary of Lorraine and the Countesses of Yarrow and Arran. Thereon was depicted a female kneeling with dishevelled hair before a cross, and around her was the motto—
"Afflictæ Ecclesiæ ne Obliviscaris."
The great squares or close columns of Scottish infantry were formed in admirable order, but in the ancient and somewhat unwieldy fashion of their country. Drawn up shoulder to shoulder, each soldier carried his spear, which was six Scots ells (i.e. eighteen feet) in length, pointing to the front; the first rank knelt, the next stooped, the third stood erect; but all had their weapons levelled at three angles towards the foe; thus the Scots were "so completely defended by the close order in which they were formed, and by the length of their lances, that to charge them seemed to be as rash as to oppose your bare hands to a hedgehog's bristles."
Lances, two-handed swords, and daggers, with mauls and Jethart staves, were the arms of the cavalry, who were all in complete mail, except the Borderers, who were always lightly armed, and seldom wore more than a skull-cap and breastplate or splinted jack, with plate sleeves and gloves of steel. A few were armed with wheel-lock pistols, which were brought from Italy or Flanders; but in the art of war, in order, and, above all, in perfect obedience, as well as in the discipline of the Boulogners and the new fashion of weapons, arquebuse and culiver, by which their auxiliaries the foreign horse and foot were armed, the English on this day were every way superior to the Scots.