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

INTRODUCTION. XV
experienced counsellors, were alike unable to sub-
due in James the blazing zeal of romantic chival-
ry. The monarch, and the flower of his nobles,
precipitately rushed to the fatal field of Flodden, 1.513
whence they were never to return.
The minority of James V. presents a melan-
choly scene. Scotland, through all its extent, felt
the truth of the adage, " that the country is hap-
" less, whose prince is a child." But the Border
counties, exposed from their situation to the incur-
sions of the English, deprived of many of their
most gallant chiefs, and harassed by the intestine
struggles of the survivors, were reduced to a wil-
derness, inhabited only by the beasts of the field,
and by a few more brutal warriors. Lord Home,
the chamberlain and favourite of James IV.,
leagued with the Earl of Angus, who married the
widow of his sovereign, held, for a time, the chief
sway upon the East Border. Albany, the regent of
the kingdom, bred in the French court, and more
accustomed to wield the pen than the sword, fee-
bly endeavoured to conti'oul a lawless nobility, to
whom his manners appeared strange, and his per-
son despicable. It was in vain that he inveigled 1516