Transactions. 167 



Baliol's aims. In Auj^^ist, 1332, he was victorious at Duplin, and 

 in September was crowned at Scone, King of Scotland by the 

 grace of Edward III. 



As tiie winter advanced, he journeyed south with his followers — 

 Till Anand held thai southward syne.* 

 On 15th December he lay with a small army at Annan. He 

 had arrived there on the 13th, and meant to stay till 

 Christmas.! The fortunes of war proverbially uncertain were 

 doomed to fall out otherwise. On the night of the 15th the young 

 Earl of Mar, the Steward of Scotland, Sir Thomas Eraser, and Sir 

 Archibald Douglas secretly assembled 1000 horse at Moffat. J 

 Ere day broke they had ridden to Annan. Could they only fall 

 suddenly upon the puppet King and his Englishmen it would be 

 a stalwart stroke for Scotland ! Fate favoured the enterprise. 

 Baliol and his Englishmen were in their beds never dreaming of 

 danger. They were, perhaps, as a contemporary§ states, over-secure 

 in consequence of the victories they had previously obtained. 

 On the morning of 16th December the band of Scots burst upon 

 them " in the dawyng " of the day.|| There was stout fight 

 shewn, but the surprise was too thorough to be withstood. 

 English chroniclelT prides itself on the vigour of the resistance of 

 the naked men who gave so good an account of themselves that 

 no fewer than 30 of the Scots were slain. At least 100 of the 

 adherents of Baliol were slain, amongst them several Scottish 

 knights. Baliol himself had a narrow escape. Like the man in 

 tiie rhyme with one shoe off and the other shoe on, he had to 

 flee with his toilet incomplete. The national contempt for the 



Baliols — the day of the Dumfries County Council^ was not yet 



found expression in the satisfaction with which Scottish chronicle 

 records the flight of this scion of their house, who soon afterwards 



* Wyntoun, viii. ch. 26, line 3677. 



fChronides of Edward I. and Edward II. (R.S.), ii., 109-110; Chron. 

 Lanercost, 271. One authority says he had appointed a Parliament to be 

 held there. Knyghton in Decern Scriptores, 2562. 



tBoiver, Scotichronicon, ii., 308. 



%Ohron. Lanercost, 271. 



llThe battle is described in Wyntoun, viii. ch., 26; Chron. Lanercost, 

 270-1 ; Scalacronica, 161 ; Decern Scriptores, 2562 ; Chron. Ed I and 

 Ed. II. (R.S.), ii., 109-110 ; Bower, ii., 308 ; Ldand changed a defeat into 

 a victory ; Scalacronica, 295. 



*iChron. Lanercost, 271. 



li^Which witt> a deplorable lack of feeling for history has, in defiance of 

 the Lyon King of Arms, put the armorial bearing of the Baliols into the 

 county seal. 



