demanded the Earl.

"Wha may ye be that comes shuggy-shooin' oot o' the bluidy city o'
Edinburgh intil oor camp," retorted him of Carsphairn, "sitting your
beast for all the warld like a lump o' potted-head whammelled oot o' a
bowl?"

"I am the Earl of Douglas."

"The Yerl o' Dooglas! Then a bonny hand they hae made o' him in
Edinburgh. I heard they had only beheaded him."

"I tell you I am Earl of Douglas. I bid you beware. Conduct me to the
tent of my sons!"

At this point an aged man of some authority stood forward and gazed
intently at James the Gross, looking beneath his hand as at an
extensive prospect of which he wished to take in all the details.

"Lads," he said, "hold your hands--it rins i' my head that this
craitur' may be Jamie, the fat Yerl o' Avondale. We'll let him gang by
in peace. His sons are decent lads."

There came from the hillmen a chorus of "Avondale he may be--there's
nae sayin' what they can breed up there by Stra'ven. But we are weel
assured that he is nae richt Douglas. Na, nae Douglas like yon man was
ever cradled or buried in Gallowa'."

At this moment Lord William Douglas, seeing the commotion on the
outposts, came down the brae through the broom. Upon seeing his father
he took the plumed bonnet from off his head, and, ordering the
Carsphairn men sharply to their places, he set his hand upon the
bridle of the gross Earl's horse. So with the two running footmen
still preserving some sort of equilibrium in his unsteady bulk, James
of Avondale was brought to the door of a tent from which floated the
banner of the Douglas house, blue with a bleeding heart upon it.

At the entering in of the pavilion, all stained and trodden into the
soil by the feet of passers-by, lay the royal banner of the Stewarts,
so placed by headstrong James Douglas the younger, in contempt of
both tutor and Chancellor, who, being but cowards and murderers, had
usurped the power of the king within the realm.

That sturdy youth came to the door of his pavilion half-dressed as he
had lain down, yawning and stretching reluctantly, for he had been on
duty all night perfecting the arrangements for besieging the town.

"James--James," cried his father, catching sight of his favourite son
rubbing sleepily his mass of crisp hair, "what's this that I hear?
That you and William are in rebellion and are defying the power o' the
anointed king--?"

At this moment the footman undid the girths of his horse, which, being