halve
your men; let the one party proceed by the river to attack them on the
one side, and the other go round the hills to cut off their retreat."[J]

[J]
"But halve your men in equal parts,
Your purpose to fulfil;
Let ae half keep the water-side,
The rest gae round the hill."
_Battle of Philiphaugh--Border Ballad._

"Ye speak skilfully," said Sir David, and he gave orders as John Brydone
had advised.

The Marquis of Montrose had been disappointed in reinforcements from his
sovereign. Of two parties which had been sent to assist him in his raid
into England, one had been routed in Yorkshire, and the other defeated
on Carlisle sands, and only a few individuals from both parties joined
him at Selkirk. A great part of his Highlanders had returned home to
enjoy their plunder; but his army was still formidable, and he imagined
that he had Scotland at his feet, and that he had nothing to fear from
anything the Covenanters could bring against him. He had been writing
despatches throughout the night; and he was sitting in the best house
in Selkirk, penning a letter to his sovereign, when he was startled
by the sounds of cannon and of musketry. He rushed to the street. The
inhabitants were hurrying from their houses--many of his cavalry were
mingling, half-dressed, with the crowd. "To horse!--to horse!" shouted
Montrose. His command was promptly obeyed; and, in a few minutes, at
the head of his cavalry, he rushed down the street leading to the river
towards Philiphaugh. The mist was breaking away, and he beheld his army
fleeing in every direction. The Covenanters had burst upon them as a
thunderbolt. A thousand of his best troops lay dead upon the field.[K]
He endeavoured to rally them, but in vain; and, cutting his way through
the Covenanters, he fled at his utmost speed, and halted not until he
had arrived within a short distance of where the delightful watering
town of Innerleithen now stands, when he sought a temporary
resting-place in the house of Lord Traquair.

[K] Sir Walter Scott says that "the number of slain in the field did
not exceed three or four hundred." All the authorities I have seen state
the number at a thousand. He also accuses Lesly of abusing his victory
by slaughtering many of his prisoners in cold blood. Now, it is true that
a hundred of the Irish adventurers were shot; but this was in pursuance
of an act of both Parliaments, and not from any private re