D ST. MARGARET'S LOCH]

The "Schort Memorial of the Scottis Cronikles," called the Auchinleck
Chronicle, gives a brief but striking account of the proceedings that
followed. Earl Douglas's retainers and kinsmen would seem to have been
struck dumb by the event, and probably fled in horror and dismay; but it
was not till long after, when the King had left Stirling, that the
younger brothers returned, on St. Patrick's Day in Lent, bringing with
them the safe-conduct with all its seals, which they exhibited at the
cross and dragged through the streets tied to a horse's tail, with many
wild and fierce words against the King and all that were with him,
ending by spoiling and burning the town. As James was no longer in it,
however, nor apparently any one who could resist them, this was a cheap
and unsatisfactory vengeance.

Some months after, in the summer of 1452, a Parliament was held at
Edinburgh, in which the three Estates passed a declaration that no
safe-conduct had been given on that fatal occasion--a declaration which
it is evident no one believed, and which probably was justified by some
quibble which saved the consciences of those who asserted it. The new
Earl, James Douglas, was summoned to appear at this Parliament, but
answered by a letter under his seal and that of his brother, which was
secretly affixed to the door of the Parliament House, "declynand from
the King, saying that they held not of him, nor would hold with him,
with many other slanderous words, calling them traitors that were his
secret council." Some say it was upon the church doors that this
defiance was attached. In any case it must have produced a wonderful hum
and commotion through the town, where already no doubt the slaying of
the Douglas had been discussed from every point of view--at the cross,
and among the groups at the street corners, where there would be many
adherents of the Douglas, and many citizens ready to discuss the new
event and all its possible consequences. The Parliament was followed by
a general muster upon the Burrowmuir, where the barons and their men
gathered, with all their spears and steel caps glistening in the June
sunshine, with an apparent intention of pursuing the race to its
stronghold and making an end of it. The raid, which was led by the King
in person, with an army of some thirty thousand men, accomplished little
however, doing more mischief than good the chronicle says, treading down
the new corn, and spoilin