lace,
under the command of Sir William Keith, and he himself assembled a great
army on the frontiers, ready to penetrate into England as soon as Edward
should have invested that place. The English army was less numerous,
but better supplied with arms and provisions, and retained in stricter
discipline; and the king, notwithstanding the valiant defence made by
Keith, had in two months reduced the garrison to extremities, and had
obliged them to capitulate: they engaged to surrender, if they were not
relieved within a few days by their countrymen.[**] This intelligence
being conveyed to the Scottish army, which was preparing to invade
Northumberland, changed their plan of operations, and engaged them
to advance towards Berwick, and attempt the relief of that important
fortress. Douglas, who had ever purposed to decline a pitched battle,
in which he was sensible of the enemy's superiority, and who intended
to have drawn out the war by small skirmishes, and by mutually ravaging
each other's country, was forced, by the impatience of his troops, to
put the fate of the kingdom upon the event of one day. He attacked the
English at Halidown Hill, a little north of Berwick; and though his
heavy-armed cavalry dismounted, in order to render the action more
steady and desperate, they were received with such valor by Edward, and
were so galled by the English archers, that they were soon thrown into
disorder and on the fall of Douglas, their general, were totally routed.
The whole army fled in confusion, and the English, but much more the
Irish, gave little quarter in the pursuit: all the nobles of chief
distinction were either slain or taken prisoners: near thirty thousand
of the Scots fell in the action; while the loss of the English amounted
only to one knight, one esquire, and thirteen private soldiers; an
inequality almost incredible.[***]

* Cotton's Abridg.

** Rymer, vol. iv. p. 564, 565, 566

*** Heming. p. 275, 276, 277. Knyghton, p. 2559. Otterborne,
p 115.

After this fatal blow, the Scottish nobles had no other resource than
instant submission; and Edward, leaving a considerable body with Baliol
to complete the conquest of the kingdom, returned with the remainder
of his army to England. Baliol was acknowledged king by a parliament
assembled at Edinburgh;[*] the superiority of England was again
recognized; many of the Scottish nobility swore fealty to Edward; and to
complete the misfortunes of that