for her sake. Pitscottie adds, that she sent him also fourteen thousand French
crowns to pay his expenses, a circumstance that detracts in a considerable degree from the wildness of the enterprise, and brings the whole nearly to the
level of a foolish bargain. James, thus prompted, called a parliament, where,
contrary to the declared opinion of all the wiser members, the promises of La
Motte the French ambassador, the subserviency of the clergy, who either enjoyed or expected Gallic pensions, and the eagerness of James, caused war to be determined on against England, and a day to be appointed for assembling the army.
The army was raised accordingly, and James, crossing the borders, stormed the
castles of Norham, Wark, and Ford, wasting without mercy all the adjoining
country. In a short time, one of his female prisoners, the lady Heron of Ford,
ensnared him in an amour, in consequence of which he neglected the care of
his army, and suffered the troops to lie idle in a country that could not yield
them subsistence -for any length of time. His army, of course, soon began to
disperse. The nobles, indeed, remained with their relations and immediate
retainers ; but even these were highly dissatisfied, and were anxious to return
home, taking Berwick by the way, which they contended would yield them a
richer reward for their labour than all the villages on the border. James, however, obstinate and intractable, would listen to no advice, and on the 9th day of September, 1513, came to an action with the English, under the earl of Surrey, who, by a skilful countermarch had placed himself between James and his own country. James, whether from ignorance or wilfulness, allowed his enemies quietly to take every advantage, and when they had done so, set fire to his tents, and descended from a strong position on the ridge of Flodden into the plain to meet them. The consequences were such as the temerity of his conduct merited; he was totally routed, being cut off himself, with almost the whole of the Scottish nobility, together with the archbishop of St Andrews, and many of the dignified clergy. The news of this most disastrous battle so deeply affected
the gentle spirit of bishop Elphinston, that he never was seen to smile afterwards. He, however, attended in parliament to give his advice in the deplorable state to which the nation was reduced. The queen had been by the late king named as regent so long as she remained unmarried, and this, though contrary to the practice of the country, which had never hitherto admitted of a female exercising regal authority, was, from the scarcity of men qualified either by rank or talents for filling the situation, acquiesced in, especially by those who wished for peace, which they supposed, and justly, as the event proved,
she might have some influence in procuring. It was but a few months, however, till she was married, and the question then came to be discussed anew, and with still greater violence.
Such a man as Elphinston was not to be spared to his country in this desperate crisis; for as he was on his journey to Edinburgh to attend a meeting of parliament, he was taken ill by the way, and died on the 25th of October, 1514; being in the eighty-third year of his age. He was, according to his own directions, buried in the collegiate church of Aberdeen.
Bishop Elphinston is one of those ornaments of the Catholic church, who sometimes appear in spite of the errors of that faith. He seems to have been a really good and amiable man. He wrote, as has been already remarked, the Lives of Scottish Saints, which are now lost He composed also a history of Scotland, from the earliest period of her history, down to his own time, which is still preserved in the Bodleian library at Oxford. It is said to consist of eleven books, occupying three hundred and eighty-four pages in folio, written in a small hand, and full of contractions, and to be nearly the same as Fordun, so that we should suppose it scarcely worthy of the trouble it would take to
