SCOTLAND (HISTORY). 



143 



cidnt feudal practice^ common at the perio'd. Wil- 

 liam himself, while he was independent sovereign 

 of England, did homage to the king of France for 

 his possessions in Normandy. In later times, how- 

 ever, the kings of England, to justify their aggres- 

 sions upon Scotland, affirmed, that the homage paid 

 by the Scottish kings was not only for the provin- 

 ces which they at the time possessed in England, 

 but also for the kingdom of Scotland. But the 

 Scottish kings, while they rendered the homage de- 

 manded for their possessions in England, uniformly 

 disavowed that they were subject to any claim of 

 homage on account of the kingdom of Scotland. This 

 question was the ostensible cause of many bloody 

 wars ; and even so far down as the Union between 

 the two nations, it was revived by some English 

 writers, who endeavoured to depreciate the claims 

 of Scotland, by disputing its ancient independency. 

 These writers were triumphantly answered on the 

 other side ; and to all impartial minds it appeared 

 that, whatever might be the extent of the feudal 

 tenure, nothing could be more paltry than to draw 

 from such an obsolete deed a claim against a king- 

 dom, which had been de facto so long independent, 

 and which had so nobly maintained its independence 

 in a hundred battles. 



Malcolm Caenmore, and his eldest son, were 

 slain in attempting to take the castle of Alnwick, 

 A. D. 1093. Though he left male heirs yet his 

 throne was usurped, first by Donald Bane, and 

 afterward? by Duncan, his natural son. By the 

 interposition of the king of England, however, 

 Edgar, lawful son of Malcolm, was placed upon the 

 Scottish throne. After a reign of no great length, 

 and distinguished by no remarkable event, Edgar 

 died in 1 107, and was succeeded by Alexander, a 

 prince who rendered himself chiefly remarkable by 

 his severe administration of justice. A conspiracy 

 formed against the life of the king was dissipated 

 by the vigour of his measures; and after assisting 

 Henry I. of England in a war with the Welsh, he 

 died in 1124. Having left behind him no issue, 

 Alexander was succeeded by David his younger 

 brother, commonly called St David, on account of 

 his great piety and excessive liberality to the 

 church and clergy. David interested himself in 

 the affairs of England, espousing the cause of Maud 

 against Stephen. In several engagements he was 

 successful, but was in others defeated; and found 

 himself unable effectually to support the cause 

 which he had undertaken. He died in 1153, and 

 was succeeded by Malcolm IV. a prince of a weak 

 body, and no less feeble mind, who distinguished 

 himself only by his continence; and, in 1165, left 

 his crown to his brother William. This prince, in 

 the beginning of his reign, recovered from Henry 

 of England, the earldom of Northumberland, which 

 had been relinquished by Malcolm ; but afterwards 

 leading an army into England, and conducting him- 

 self with too little caution, he was made prisoner 

 by surprise, and detained in captivity, till, in order 

 to regain his liberty, he consented to declare him- 

 self a vassal of England, and to do homage for his 

 whole kingdom. Richard Cceur de Lion, however, 

 who succeeded Henry, remitted the oppressive 

 terms, and declared Scotland to be an independent 

 kingdom: a measure to which he was induced, 

 partly by the injustice of the claim itself, and partly 

 by his wish of rendering the Scots his friends, 

 during an expedition which he was about to under- 

 take into Palestine. William showed his gratitude 

 for the restoration of his independence, by con 



tinning a faithful ally of the English, till his death 

 in 1214. 



Alexander II. who succeeded his father, took 

 the side of the English barons, in their contentions 

 with John, their feeble and imprudent monarch. 

 He was a wise and good prince, and maintained 

 with steadiness and spirit the independency of hia 

 crown abroad, and the authority of his government 

 at home. He died in the small isle of Kerrara, 

 A. D. 1249, in the fifty-first year of his age and 

 thirty-fifth of his reign, and was succeeded by his 

 only son, of the same name, a child in the eighth 

 year of his age. 



Alexander III. was crowned at Scone, 13th 

 July, 1249. He had been betrothed, when an in- 

 fant, to the princess Margaret of England. Their 

 nuptials were celebrated at York in 1251, and 

 Alexander did homage to Henry for his English 

 possessions. The latter insidiously demanded hom- 

 age for the kingdom of Scotland, but the prince re- 

 plied with spirit, that he had been invited to York 

 to marry the princess of England, not to treat of 

 state affairs, and that he would not take so impor- 

 tant a step without the concurrence of the national 

 council. One of the principal events of Alexan- 

 der's reign was the Battle of Largs. Haco, king 

 of Norway, having collected a fleet of one hundred 

 and sixty ships, sailed towards Scotland with a 

 numerous army, A. D. 1263, with a view to re- 

 cover such of the western isles as had formerly be- 

 longed to his crown, but which had been wrested 

 from it by the Scots. He made himself master of 

 Arran and Bute, and afterwards landed on the coast 

 of Ayrshire. Alexander attacked him at Largs, 

 October 2. After a fierce contest, victory at last 

 declared for the Scots, and the greater part of the 

 invading army fell either in the action or the pur- 

 suit. Haco reached the Orkneys, where he soon 

 afterwards died, as is said, of a broken heart, 

 and was succeeded by Magnus, who, discouraged 

 by the disaster which had befallen his father, yielded 

 all his rights to the Western Islands and the Isle of 

 Man (A. D. 1266) to the crown of Scotland, for 

 the sum of 4000 merks, to be paid in four years, 

 and a quit rent of one hundred merks yearly. The 

 Norwegians still retained the Orkney and Shetland 

 Islands. From this period, Alexander was employed 

 for several years in maintaining the independence 

 of the Scottish church against the pretensions of 

 the pope, and in restraining the encroachments of 

 the clergy. His reign was a long and prosperous 

 one, and his death was, in its consequences, a seri- 

 ous calamity to Scotland. While riding in the 

 dusk of the evening along the sea-coast of Fife, 

 his horse started or stumbled, and he was thrown 

 over the rock and killed on the spot. This event 

 took place on the 19th March, 1286. 



III. From the death of Alexander III. to that of 

 James V., A. D. 1542. Alexander left only one 

 grandchild, a female infant, in a foreign country. 

 His own children had all died before him. His 

 daughter, Margaret, had married Eric, king of Nor- 

 way, and died, leaving issue one daughter, Mar- 

 garet, commonly called the Maiden of Norway, the 

 now undoubted heiress of the crown of Scotland, 

 and recognised as such by the states of the kingdom 

 about three weeks after Alexander's death. The 

 same convention appointed a regency of six noble- 

 men during the absence of the young queen. These 

 regents for some time acted with wisdom and 

 unanimity; but two of them dying, dissensions 

 arose among the remaining four; and Eric, king of 



