Warbeck, to welcome him to Scotland in 1495 with all the honours due to a prince, to bestow upon him the hand of Lady Catherine Gordon, the most beautiful and accomplished woman in Scotland, and ultimately involved him in a war with England. In 1497, however, a truce for seven years was concluded between the two kingdoms, which was followed by negotiations for the marriage of the Scottish king to Margaret, eldest daughter of Henry VII. of England. The marriage treaty was finally signed on 21st January, 1502, and this auspicious union, which was in the end productive of such inestimable benefits to both countries, was finally consummated in June, 1503. This alliance with England left James at liberty to direct his whole energies to the suppression of a rebellion which had broken out in the Highlands, to provide for the future tranquillity of these districts, and to inflict condign punishment on the border freebooters. James now renewed his intercourse with France, and showed the influence which he exerted on the general affairs of Europe by supporting the duke of Gueldres against the many encroachments of the house of Austria, and by mediating between the king of Denmark and his rebellious subjects. He received, too, at this period a consecrated hat and sword from the warlike pontiff, Pope Julius II., who wished to detach James from his alliance with France. It was this alliance which unfortunately led to the ruin of the Scottish king. His imperious brother-in-law, Henry VIII., had joined the coalition against France; and James, whose sympathies were enlisted on the side of his ancient ally, soon found himself involved in the quarrel. Causes of mutual offence sprung up, and inroads were made by the borderers on both sides. The mind of the Scottish king was inflamed by the capture of two privateers commanded by the famous Andrew Barton, who fell in the engagement with two English men-of-war. Various petty injuries contributed to deepen the quarrel; and finally the French queen addressed a letter to James, calling herself his mistress, and imploring him to advance three steps into England for her sake. James, thus goaded on by sympathy for his ally, by a rankling sense of injury, and by fantastic notions of honour, declared war against England; and disregarding the tears and entreaties of his queen, and the remonstrances of his wisest counsellors, he mustered the array of his kingdom and crossed the Tweed, 22d August, 1513. After capturing the castle of Norham and a few border towers, he encamped on the Till, near its junction with the Tweed, and idled away his time until the earl of Surrey had succeeded in raising a powerful army, and marching to the borders, placed himself between the Scots and their own country. With incredible infatuation James refused to allow an attack to be made upon the English, or even a gun to be fired upon their columns as they crossed the Till by a narrow bridge at Twisel. But as soon as they were drawn up in order of battle on the plain, he quitted the ridge of Flodden on which his army was encamped, and advanced to meet the enemy. The battle began at four in the afternoon, and lasted till night separated the combatants. The English lost about five thousand, the Scots about eight or ten thousand men; but the former were for the most part common soldiers, while the latter included the Scottish king, with the flower of his nobility, gentry, and even clergy. There was scarcely a Scottish family of distinction which did not lose at least one, and some of them lost all their male members that were capable of bearing arms. The body of the king was found among the thickest of the slain, much disfigured by wounds, and was embalmed and ultimately placed in the monastery of Sheen in Surrey. James, who thus perished in the forty-second year of his age and twenty-sixth of his reign, was one of the most popular of the Scottish sovereigns. He possessed excellent abilities, was expert in all martial and manly exercises, was passionately fond of music and poetry, a skilful performer on the lute and other musical instruments, and a zealous patron both of the useful and ornamental arts. To him belongs the honour of having first introduced printing into Scotland. On the other hand he was fond of pleasure, licentious in his habits, and profuse in his expenditure. His disposition was frank and generous, but he was headstrong, impetuous, and impatient of contradiction; and his dogged obstinacy, recklessness, and fantastic sense of honour led to his own destruction, and brought fearful calamities on his kingdom. He was succeeded by his only surviving legitimate child—
James V., who was born in 1512, and was only eighteen months old at the time of his father's death. His accession to the throne took place at a most perilous crisis of affairs. At war with England, torn by intestine feuds, most ungratefully refused assistance by the French court, at whose instigation hostilities had been undertaken, Scotland imperatively required the hand of a wise, vigorous, and upright statesman to guide its counsels at this juncture; and unfortunately no such man could be found. The country was distracted by the contentions of the English and French factions—the former headed by the queen-dowager and her second husband the earl of Angus, the latter by the duke of Albany the regent—and by the intrigues of Henry VIII., and the private feuds of the nobles. The early education of James was intrusted to the famous Sir David Lindsay; and under the care of this wise, affectionate, and learned tutor the young prince was instructed in all manly and liberal accomplishments, and was trained "to the practice of virtue and self-restraint." But this course of education, so well fitted to make her son a wise and great sovereign, was unfortunately interrupted by the queen-dowager, who, with her characteristic recklessness, put him at the head of the government on reaching his thirteenth year, in order that she and her faction might misgovern the kingdom in his name. The sycophants and flatterers by whom he was now surrounded not only neglected his education, but basely pandered to his passions in order that they might retain their ascendancy over him, and thus inflicted irreparable injury upon his character. In the following year, 1525, the custody of the royal person fell into the hands of the Douglases, who for several years cruelly oppressed the people, and tyrannized over the king himself. At length, in 1528, James by a dexterous stratagem made his escape from the hateful thraldom in which he had been so long kept, and for the first time assumed the position of an independent sovereign. He lost no time in adopting prompt and vigorous measures to vindicate his authority. The Douglases and their abettors, who had entered into a traitorous league with England, were stripped of their estates and expelled from the kingdom, the border freebooters were severely punished, the insurgent Highlanders were chastised, the ancient commercial treaty between Scotland and the Netherlands was renewed, the college of justice was instituted, and steps were taken for the protection of the poor and the oppressed against the tyranny of the barons. These measures were highly popular, and, combined with his affable manners, his sympathy for the common people, and the delight which he took in visiting the houses of the peasantry in disguise, acquired for James the name of the "king of the commons." In 1536 James undertook a voyage to France for the purpose of promoting the negotiations which he had for some time carried on for a union with a princess of the French blood royal; and on the 1st of January, 1537, he was married in the cathedral of Notre Dame to Magdalene, daughter of Francis I., seven cardinals surrounding the altar. After remaining nine months in France, James returned to his own country with his bride in May following, and was welcomed with enthusiastic rejoicings; but to the great grief of her husband and the whole nation, the young and beautiful queen died in less than two months after her arrival. James was still disposed to seek an alliance with France rather than with Henry or the emperor, both of whom made overtures to him; and in June, 1538, he married Mary of Guise, widow of the duke of Longueville—an alliance which was ultimately followed by disastrous consequences to the welfare of the royal family and of the country. Meanwhile the struggle for the reformation of the church had been carried on with great keenness on the continent and in England, and the principles of the reformed faith were silently but steadily making progress in Scotland. There is reason to believe that at one time James was inclined to favour the cause of the Reformation, and that he looked with a severe eye upon the overgrown wealth, idleness, and corruption of the clergy. Henry was exceedingly desirous that his royal nephew should imitate his ecclesiastical policy, and strove both by urgent exhortations and by magnificent promises to induce him to suppress the religious houses, and to declare his independence of the royal see. James, however, like his predecessors, was bent on reducing the overgrown power of the nobility, which he found to be incompatible equally with the royal authority and the welfare of the people. In order to carry out his schemes for this purpose, he found it necessary to rely on the support of the clergy, and to countenance their cruel policy for the suppression of the reformed faith. They on their part strove to bring about a
