laws; if they would betray me they might get their pardons, and cause me to be hanged, but I have tried them ere this.' This strict observance of pledged faith tended much to soften the rigors of war; for when a borderer made a prisoner, he esteemed it wholly unnecessary to lead him into actual captivity or confinement. He simply accepted his word to be a true prisoner, and named a time and place where he expected him to come to treat about his ransom. If they were able to agree, a term was usually assigned for the payment and security given; if not, the prisoner surrendered himself to the discretion of his captor. But where the interest of both parties pointed so strongly towards the necessity of mutual accommodation, it rarely happened that they did not agree upon terms. Thus even in the encounters of these rude warriors on either side, the nations maintained the character of honor, courage, and generosity assigned to them by Froissart. Englishmen on the one party and Scotsmen on the other party, are good men of war; for when they meet, there is a hard fight without sparing; there is no hoo (i. e. there is no cessation for parley) between them, as long as spears, swords, axes or daggers will endure; but they lay on each other, and when they be well beaten, and that the one party hath obtained the victory, they then glory so in their deeds of arms, and are so joyful, that such as be taken they shall be ransomed ere they go out of the field; so that shortly each of them is so content with the other, that at their departing courteously, they will say God thank you.' But in fighting one with another, there is no play nor sparing.

Of the other qualities and habits of the borderers we are much left to form our own conjectures. That they were a people of some accomplishments, fond of the legends of their own exploits, and of their own rude poetry and music, is proved by the remains still preserved of both. They were skilful antiquaries, accord

ing to Roger North, in whatever concerned their own bounds. Lesley gives them the praise of great and artful eloquence when reduced to plead for their lives: also that they were temperate in food and liquors, and rarely tasted those of an intoxicating quality. Their females caught the warlike spirit of the country, and appear often to have mingled in battle. Fair maiden Liliard, whose grave is still pointed out upon the field of battle at Anoram-Moor, called from her name, Liliard's Edge, seems to have been a heroine of this description. And Holingshed records them at the conflict fought near Naworth (A. D. 1570) between Leonard Dacres and Lord Hunsden, the former had in his company many desperate women, who there gave the adventure of their lives, and fought right stoutly.' This is a change in the habits of the other sex which can only be produced by early and daily familiarity with scenes of hazard, blood and death. The borderers, however, merited the devoted attachment of their wives, if, as we learn, one principal use of the wealth they obtained by plunder was to bestow it in ornamenting the persons of their partners.

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PRESENT STATE OF THE BORDERS, AND CHARACTER OF THE INHABITANTS.

Hospitality, kindness and most minute attention to the comfort and ease of their guests, mark the character of Scotch gentlemen of the present day, whilst the peasantry are equally remarkable for the same good qualities in a ruder way and the more valuable ones of correct morality, sincere piety, and an exemplary de cency in language and manners. Struggling with a poverty that almost amounts to a privation of food, and condemned to a labor before which the southern Bri

tons would sink down in listless despondence, the Scotch peasant displays a degree of patience and industry, accompanied at the same time with content, that place him on the scale of moral excellence far above those who ridicule or despise him.-Serious without moroseness; quick without asperity, and sagacious without conceit; friendly, kind and just; this may be considered as the moral portrait of such part of the Scots as are not sophisticated or spoiled by a communication with their southern neighbors, and particularly where the benefits of religious instruction and education have paved the way to more striking exemplifications of moral excellence. Of this description may we pronounce the inhabitants of the borders to be, who perhaps are more national in their manners, practices, and ideas, than the northern counties of the kingdom; from the circumstances of the effects being still felt in these parts, which have long faded away in the more distant divisions of the country. The natural consequence of those perpetual feuds which subsisted between the borderers of both kingdoms was a reciprocal rooted hatred, piously handed down from father to son, and carefully transmitted through successive generations by legendary tales and popular ballads, whose constant theme and burden were the injuries which each party had received from the other, and the vengeance which these injuries deserved.

Amongst the other Scots, the national disgust of the English, though excited before their conquest by frequent wars, had ceased (at least in a degree) as soon as those wars had terminated. But with the borderers the case had been different; their relative situation with the English prevented the wound from being closed; the cause was always operating; new occasions of rancor were ever occurring in the violence of each party; and their mutual dislike, instead of being soft

ened by time, was, on the contrary, every day increased and confirmed. Hence it happens that a great degree of coolness and dislike still subsists between the inhabitants of the respective neighboring counties, which not only operate as a bar to free conversation between them, but at the same time render the Scots infinitely more tenacious of those manners, customs, and opinions, which distinguish them from their ancient enemies.

COTTAGES AND MODE OF LIVING OF THE SCOTTISH PEASANTRY.

About sixty or seventy years ago, a great part of the cottages of the Scotch day-laborers were built with walls of turf, stone buttresses, or wooden posts, built into the wall, supporting the heavy timbers of the roof; few, comparatively, of this description exist at present, the greater part being built with stone and lime.*

The general description of the cottage of a laborer or tradesman, who keeps a cow, is a house of eighteen or twenty feet by fifteen or sixteen within walls; the door is in front, close by one of the gables; two close beds form the cross partition, dividing the space occupied by the family from a space of four feet from the gable at which you enter, where stands the cow behind one of the beds, with her tail to the door of the house. There is one window in front near the fire gable, opposite to which, at the opposite wall, stands the ambry, or shelved wooden, in which the cow's milk, and other family daily provisions are locked up; and above it, lying against the slant of the roof, is the skelf or frame,

* See Findlater's General View of the Agriculture of Peebleshire.

containing shelves, with cross-bars in front, to prevent the utensils set upon its shelves from tumbling off from its over-hanging position; the show of the house depending much upon the quality and arrangement of the crockery and other utensils placed thus, in open view upon the shelf. A chest, containing the family wardrobe, stands in front of one of the close beds, serving also for seats. The close beds are also furnished with a shelf at head and foot, upon which part of the family apparel is deposited, to preserve it from the dust. A wooden armed chair for the husband or gudeman,' when he arrives fatigued from his labor, and a few stools, among which is one called the buffet stool, for the rest of the family, and a plunge churn, completes the inventory of the household furniture; to which only a small barrel for salted fish and another for meal may be added, if the family can afford to lay in stores, and are not from hand to mouth.

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The cooking utensils consist of a small cast-iron pot, in which is daily prepared the oatmeal porridge, the universal breakfast, eaten with milk, or with homebrewed weak ale from treacle, when the milk season is over, in which also the potatoes are boiled, as the universal supper, while they last, eaten either with milk, or merely with salt; in which is also prepared for dinner, through winter, potatoes dressed with mutton suet for the purpose, or broth, to be eaten with bread made universally with shelled barley, and kale from the kale-yard, and, according to circumstances, either with or without a bit of salted mutton, to give them a relish. The butter from the cow being all sold fresh, from the high price it bears in such vicinity to Edinburgh, being the chief dependence for money to pay for the cow's summer grass, and to purchase the winter's fodder the skimmed milk only being used by the family, in the manner already stated, or, when most plenty in summer, serving for dinner broth.