middle-aged, woman, at the period of her being besieged in the fortress, which she so well defended. If the editor might indulge a conjecture, he would suppose, that the prophecy was contrived for the encouragement of the English invaders, during the Scottish wars; and that the names of the Countess of Dunbar, and of Thomas of Ercildoune, were used for the greater credit of the forgery. According to this hypothesis, it seems likely to have been composed after the siege of Dunbar, which had made the name of the countess well known, and consequently in the reign of Edward III. The whole tendency of the prophecy is to aver, "that "there shall be no end of the Scottish war (concerning "which the question was proposed), till a final conquest "of the country by England, attended by all the usual "severities of war. When the cultivated country shall "become forest-says the prophecy;when the wild "animals shall inhabit the abode of men ;-when Scots "shall not be able to escape the English, should they "crouch as hares in their form;"All these denunciations seem to refer to the time of Edward III., upon whose victories the prediction was probably founded. The mention of the exchange betwixt a colt worth ten markes, and a quarter of "whaty (indifferent) wheat,” seems to allude to the dreadful famine, about the year 1388. The independence of Scotland was, however, as impregnable to the mines of superstition, as to the steel of our more powerful and more wealthy neighbours. The war of Scotland is, thank God, at an end; but it is ended without her people having either crouched, like

hares in their form, or being drowned in their flight "for faute of ships,"-thank God for that too. The prophecy, quoted in p. 86, is probably of the same date, and intended for the same purpose. A minute search of the records of the time would, probably, throw additional light upon the allusions contained in these ancient legends. Among various rhymes of prophetic import, which are at this day current amongst the people of Teviotdale, is one, supposed to be pronounced by Thomas the Rhymer, presaging the destruction of his habi tation and family:

The hare sall kittle (litter) on my hearth-stane,
And there will never be a laird Learmont again.

The first of these lines is obviously borrowed from that in the MS. of the Harl. Library," When hares "kendles o' the her'stane," an emphatic image of desolation. It is also inaccurately quoted in the prophecy of Waldhave, published by Andro Hart, 1613:

"This is a true talking that Thomas of tells,

"The hare shall hirple on the hard (hearth) stane." Spottiswoode, an honest, but credulous historian, seems to have been a firm believer in the authenticity of the prophetic wares, vended in the name of Thomas of Ercildoun. "The prophecies, yet extant in Scottish

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rhymes, whereupon he was commonly called Thomas "the Rhymer, may justly be admired; having foretold, "so many ages before, the union of England and Scot“land in the ninth degree of the Bruce's blood, with

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"the succession of Bruce himself to the crown, being "yet a child, and other divers particulars, which the " event hath ratified and made good. Boethius, in his "story, relateth his prediction of King Alexander's "death, and that he did foretel the same to the Earl of "March, the day before it fell out; saying, 'That be"fore the next day at noon, such a tempest should "blow, as Scotland had not felt for many years before.' "The next morning, the day being clear, and no change "appearing in the air, the nobleman did challenge Tho"mas of his saying, calling him an impostor. He re"plied, that noon was not yet passed. About which "time, a post came to advertise the earl, of the king "his sudden death. 'Then,' said Thomas, this is the (C tempest I foretold; and so it shall prove to Scotland.' "Whence, or how, he had this knowledge, can hardly "be affirmed; but sure it is, that he did divine and "answer truly of many things to come."-SPOTTISWOODE, p. 47. Besides that notable voucher, master Hector Boece, the good archbishop might, had he been so minded, have referred to Fordun for the prophecy of King Alexander's death. That historian calls our bard "ruralis ille vates."-FORDUN, lib. x. cap. 40.

6

What Spottiswoode calls "the prophecies extant in Scottish rhyme," are the metrical predictions ascribed to the prophet of Ercildoun, which, with many other compositions of the same nature, bearing the names of Bede, Merlin, Gildas, and other approved soothsayers, are contained in one small volume, published by Andro

Hart, at Edinburgh, 1615. The late excellent Lord Hailes made these compositions the subject of a dissertation, published in his Remarks on the History of Scotland. His attention is chiefly directed to the celebrated prophecy of our bard, mentioned by Bishop Spottiswoode, bearing, that the crowns of England and Scotland should be united in the person of a king, son of a French queen, and related to Bruce in the ninth degree. Lord Hailes plainly proves, that this prophecy is perverted from its original purpose, in order to apply it to the succession of James VI. The ground-work of the forgery is to be found in the prophecies of Berlington, contained in the same collection, and runs thus ;

Of Bruce's left side shall spring out as a leafe,

As neere as the ninth degree;

And shall be fleemed of faire Scotland,

In France farre beyond the sea,

And then shall come againe ryding,

With eyes that many men may see.

At Aberladie he shall light,

With hempen helteres and horse of tree.

However it happen for to fall,

The lyon shal be lord of all;

The French quen shal bearre the sonne,

Shal rule all Brittaine to the sea;

Ane from the Bruce's blood shal come also,

As neere as the ninth degree.

Yet shal there come a keene knight over the salt sea,

A keene man of courage and bold man of armes;

A duke's son doubled (i. e. dubbed), a borne man in France,
That shall our mirths augment, and mend all our harmes ;

After the date of our Lord 1513, and thrice three thereafter;

Which shall brooke all the broad isle to himself,

Between 13 and thrice three the threip shal be ended,
The Saxons sall never recover after.

There cannot be any doubt, that this prophecy was intended to excite the confidence of the Scottish nation in the Duke of Albany, regent of Scotland, who arrived from France in 1515, two years after the death of James IV. in the fatal field of Flodden. The regent was descended of Bruce by the left, i. e. by the female side, within the ninth degree. His mother was daughter of the Earl of Boulogne, his father banished from his country" fleemit of fair Scotland." His arrival must necessarily be by sea, and his landing was expected at Aberlady, in the Frith of Forth. He was a duke's son, dubbed knight; and nine years, from 1513, are allowed him, by the pretended prophet, for the accomplishment of the salvation of his country, and the exaltation of Scotland over her sister and rival. -All this was a pious fraud, to excite the confidence and spirit of the country.

The prophecy, put in the name of our Thomas the Rhymer, as it stands in Hart's book, refers to a later period. The narrator meets the Rhymer upon a land beside a lee, who shows him many emblematical visions, described in no mean strain of poetry. They chiefly relate to the fields of Flodden and Pinkie, to the national distress which followed these defeats, and to future hal