J. F. Campbell Collection > Minstrelsy of the Scottish border > Volume 1

VI INTRODUCTION.
earliest of which is hardly coeval Avith James V.,
such an enquiry would he equally difficult and vain.
If we may trust the Welch bards, in their account
of the wars betwixt the Saxons and Danes of Deira
570 and the Cumraig, imagination can hardly ibrm any
idea of conflicts more desperate, than were main-
tained, on the Borders, between the ancient British
and their Teutonic invaders. Thus, the Gododin
describes the waste and devastation of mutual ha-
voc, in colours so glowing, as strongly to recal the
words of Tacitus ; " Et uhi solitudmem Juciunty
pacem appellant.'"*'
At a later period, the Saxon families, who fled
from the exterminating sword of the Conqueror,
with many of the Normans themselves, whom dis-
content and intestine feuds had driven into exile.
* In the spirited translation of this poem, by Jones, the fol-
lowing verses are highly descriptive of the exhausted state of
the victor array : —
At Madoc's tent the clarion sounds.
With rapid clangour hurried far :
Each echoing dell the note resotinds —
But when return the sons of war !
Thou, born of stern Necessity,
Dull Peace ! the desert yields to thee,
And owns thy melancholy sway.