Mr. Jeffrey on Jedburgh. 349 



courts of the king for the administration of justice to an ex- 

 tensive district. But so unruly and numerous were the 

 accused parties and their friends, that it often required the 

 presence of the king with an army of 6000 men to enforce 

 ohedience to the law. In 1510 James IV. placed 200 of the 

 clan TurnbuU at the bar with halters round their necks, 

 several of whom were hanged, others imprisoned, and the 

 rest dismissed on giving hostages for their future good beha- 

 viour. And here I may advert to the reproachful phrase of 

 *^ Jeddart justice," or, ^'^ hang a man first and try him after P 

 In cases of treason, where the accused party Avas dead, it was 

 the practice to place the corpse or the dry bones at the bar 

 before the assize, lead evidence, get a verdict, and pro- 

 nounce sentence in the same way as if the person had been 

 alive. The dead bodies of the Earl of Gowrie and Alexander 

 Ruthven were produced at the trial, and sentence pronounced 

 in presence of the corpses. The bones of Logan of Restalrig, 

 which had been in the grave for many years, were dug up 

 and placed at the bar on the trial, and sentence pronounced 

 as if he had been alive. Trials of this kind were very 

 frequent during the time of the persecution. Henry Hall of 

 Haughead, on Cayle, was tried in this way. After the battle 

 of the Pentland Hills, the authorities in Scotland had recourse 

 to a new process : — that of trying in absence parties accused 

 of being present in that action. After this trial it was not 

 deemed necessary to produce the corpse or the bones at the 

 bar. On this change of practice Lord Hailes remarked : — 

 " The bones of a traitor can neither plead defences nor cross- 

 question witnesses, and upon this matter there is no differ- 

 ence whether the accused person be absent in body or present 

 in bones." Morton, in his Monastic Annals, adopts the view 

 of preceding writers, that it was the severity of George the 

 fourth Earl of Home, the father of one of the abbots, that 

 gave birth to the proverb ; but it is evident that it was not 

 the severity of the law, but the peculiar manner in which it 

 was administered in a class of cases, that gave rise to the 

 obnoxious phrase. In short, the form of trial was resorted 

 to, to enable the iniquitous government of the day to bestow 

 the estates of the deceased, who had probably been shot on 

 the hillside, on its willing tools. 



The Castle of Jedburgh, which existed during the 11th 

 century, stood upon the site of the present prison. It was of 

 great extent and strong. David I. had a garden within the 

 castle. On Edward I. being appointed referee in the dis- 



