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On the Death of Le Sieur de la Beaute, and the site of his 

 Grave. By George Muirhead, F.R.S.E. 

 [With two Plans]. 



In the fifteenth and sixteenth centuries, the Homes were a 

 very powerful family in Berwickshire, where they held great 

 possessions, with many towers and fortalices, including those of 

 Home, Wedderburn, Dunglass, Fast Castle, Eenton, Karnes, 

 Coldinghaui, Ayton, Kimmerghame, Polwarth, Hutton, Black- 

 adder, Broomhouse, and Manderston. They were descended 

 from Cospatrick, Earl of Dunbar ; — the Earl of Home being the 

 head of the family, and the Homes of Wedderburn one of its 

 leading branches. 



In the troublous times of the Eegent Albany, the Earl of 

 Home, who held the important post of Warden of the Eastern 

 Borders, and who had rendered himself obnoxious to the gover- 

 nor, was decoyed along with his brother William, to attend a 

 parliament at Edinburgh, where they were seized and confined 

 in separate prisons. The Earl was beheaded on 5th October 

 1516, and his brother William met with a like fate on the follow- 

 ing day, their goods being confiscated, and their heads affixed 

 to the most public places, as a mark of greater ignominy. 

 When the Earl and his brother had thus been disposed of, 

 Albany appointed a French knight named De la Bastie to the 

 government of Lothian, with the Castle of Dunbar for his 

 residence. He also made him Warden of the Eastern Borders, 

 where the Homes chiefly resided, and likewise conferred on him 

 the estate of Home, with the Castle of that name. This 

 high handed and merciless procedure on the part of Albany gave 

 the whole family of the Homes great offence, and more especially 

 the Homes of Wedderburn, whose chief was nearly related to the 

 Earl, and second only to him in rank and authority in the Merse- 

 The head of the family of Wedderburn at this time was David 

 Home — one of the "Seven Spears of Wedderburn" celebrated 

 in Border song — whose father Sir David, along with their eldest 

 brother George, had been killed while fighting for their king 

 and country on " Flodden's fatal field." 



David Home burned with a desire to revenge the death of his 

 kinsman and the indignities which had been cast upon the family, 

 and according to Godscroft, an opportunity of carrying out his 



