31S Sir W. Elliot on Dcnkohn and its Vicinity. 



pennon or banderol, thirteen feet long, on whicli is wrought 

 a lion passant, with a St. Andrew's or saltier cross and two 

 hearts in front, and a mullet or star with the words ^-dmnh 

 mx^m behind; and secondly, a pair of gloves richly embroid- 

 ered wath small pearls and silver, and also bearing a device 

 of a lion. They were taken by Earl Douglas from Hotspur 

 two or three days before the battle, in an encounter at the 

 barriers before the citadel of Newcastle, to which the Scottish 

 army had laid siege. These gloves were probably some (jage 

 d'amour or lady's favor, placed by Percy on his helmet in ac- 

 cordance with the usages of chivalry.* Hence Hotspur's 

 anxiety to recover them, which led to this celebrated passage 

 of aims, " of all the battles, great and small, described in this 

 history," says Froissart, "the best contested and the most 

 severe." Not the least remarkable circumstance connected 

 with it is, that it was fought for the most part by moonlight, 

 in the night between the 19th and 20th August, 1388. 



With the barony of Cavers Sir Archibald also acquired the 

 hereditary sheriffship of Teviotdale, which w^as confirmed to 

 him by royal charter in 1413. These honors were enjoyed 

 by his successors for several generations, some of them like- 

 wise holding the oifice of warden of the Marches. The family 

 has always been noted for its attachment to the cause of con- 

 stitutional freedom. Sir William the 9th and Sir Archibald 

 the 10th laird, the same who re-acquired Denholm from the 

 Cranstouns, held commissions in the parliamentary army 

 during the civil war. They both signed the confession of 

 faith and bond of union, commonly called the solemn league 

 and covenant, in 1581, which is still preserved at Cavers, and 

 exerted themselves in opposing Montrose, intercepting the 

 English levies on their way to join his army in 1646, and 

 taking part in the action at Aulderne, near Nairn, where nine 

 of Sir William's near relatives are said to have fallen. f 



The restoration brought a return of religious persecution. 

 Sir Archibald refusing to abjure his signature of the covenant 

 was fined in the sum of £o,600. He did not long survive 

 his father (who died in 1658), and was succeeded by his son 

 Sir William, who, in 1659, had married Katherine daughter 

 of Thomas Rigg of Athernie in Fife, a niece of his mother 



• All the histories declare the trophy snatched hy Douglas from his opponent 

 to have heen a pennon. But the gloves themselves prove this to he an error. 

 The pennon preserved at Cavers is a Douglas hanner, as shown by the motto and 

 cognizance. Seton's Heraldry, p. 153, 244. 



f Cotemporary record, in a family bible of the Gledstanes, preserved in 

 Hawick Museum, Also, Wilson's Memories of Hawick, pp. 182 and 192. 



