"At length a peace was concluded betwixt the two kings vnder these conditions, that Malcolme should enjoy that part of Northumberland which lieth betwixt Tweed, Cumberland, and Stainmore, and doo homage to the Kinge of England for the same. In the midst of Stainmore there shall be a crosse set up, with the Kinge of England's image on the one side, and the Kinge of Scotland's on the other, to signifie that one is march to England, and the other to Scotland. This crosse was called the Roi-crosse, that is, the cross of the kinge.”— HOLLINSHED, Lond. 1808, 4to, v. 280.

Hollinshed's sole authority seems to have been Boethius. But it is not improbable that his account may be the true one, although the circumstance does not occur in Wintoun's Chronicle. The situation of the cross, and the pains taken to defend it, seem to indicate that it was intended for a land-mark of importance.

Note XIV.

Hast thou lodged our deer ?-P. 139.

The duty of the ranger, or pricker, was first to lodge, or harbour the deer; i. e. to discover his retreat, as described at length in Note X., and then to make his report to his prince,

or master :

Before the king I come report to make,

Then husht and peace for noble Tristrame's sake
My liege, I went this morning on my quest,

My hound did sticke, and seem'd to vent some beast.

I held him short, and drawing after him,
I might behold the hart was feeding trym;
His head was high, and large in each degree,
Well paulmed eke, and seem'd full sound to be,
Of colour browne, he beareth eight and tenne,
Of stately height and long he seemed then.
His beam seem'd great, in good proportion led,
Well barred and round, well pearled neare his head.
He seemed fayre tweene blacke and berrie brounde,
He seemes well fed by all the signes I found.
For when I had well marked him with eye,
I stept aside, to watch where he would lye.
And when I so had wayted full an houre,
That he might be at layre and in his boure,
I cast about to harbour him full sure;
My hound by sent did me thereof assure

Then if he ask what slot or view I found,

I say the slot or view was long on ground;

The toes were great, the joynt bones round and short,
The shinne bones large, the dew-claws close in port:
Short ioynted was he, hollow-footed eke,

And hart to hunt as any man can seeke.

The Art of Venerie, ut supra, p. 96.

NOTES TO CANTO FOURTH.

Note I.

When Denmark's Raven soar'd on high,
Triumphant through Northumbrian sky,
Till, hovering near, their fatal croak

Bade Reged's Britons dread the yoke.—P. 143.

About the year of God 866, the Danes, under their celebrated leaders Inguar (more properly Agnar) and Hubba, sons, it is said, of the still more celebrated Regnar Lodbrog, invaded Northumberland, bringing with them the magical standard, so often mentioned in poetry, called REAFEN, or Raunfan, from its bearing the figure of a raven :

Wrought by the sisters of the Danish king,
Of furious Ivar in a midnight hour:

While the sick moon, at their enchanted song
Wrapt in pale tempest, labour'd thro' the clouds.
The demons of destruction then, they say,
Were all abroad; and, mixing with the woof
Their baleful power, the sisters ever sung;
"Shake, standard, shake this ruin on our foes."
Thomson and Mallet's Alfred.

The Danes renewed and extended their incursions, and begun to colonize, establishing a kind of capital at York, from which they spread their conquests and incursions in every direction. Stanmore, which divides the mountains of Westmoreland and Cumberland, was probably the boundary of the Danish kingdom in that direction. The district to the west, known in ancient British history by the name of Reged, had never been conquered by the Saxons, and continued to maintain a precarious independence until it was ceded to Malcolm, King of Scots, by William the Conqueror, probably on account of its similarity in language and manners to the neighbouring British kingdom of Strath-Clyde.

Upon the extent and duration of the Danish sovereignty in Northumberland, the curious may consult the various autholities quoted in the Gesta et Vestigia Danorum extra Daniam, vol. II. p. 40. The most powerful of their Northumbrian leaders seems to have been Ivar, called, from the extent of his conquests, Widfami, that is, The Strider.