164 REPORT OF MEETINGS FOR 1907 



Confessor to James II., and Lord High Treasurer of Scotland 

 from 1449 to 1453. His arms also occur on the buttress of 

 the third chapel of the nave, from which it may be inferred 

 that that portion of the nave is of the same date as the 

 South transept. The extreme West end of the nave, however, 

 appears to belong to the time of James IV., whose marriage 

 to the Princess Marg-aret of England was arranged within 

 the Abbey, the Royal Arms of Scotland and the date 1505 

 being carved on the first buttress. 



"The destruction of Melrose Abbey was due, not to the 



Reformers, but to that remarkable Defender of 

 Cause of the Faith, Henry VIII., of pious and happy 

 Defacement, memory, after his failure to arrange with the 



Estates of Scotland a marriage between our infant 

 Queen Mary and his son Edward. In 1544 a hostile English 

 force, led by Sir Ealph Eure and Sir Brian Layton, invaded 

 the Borders, and among other acts of vandalism seriously 

 damaged the Abbey and its monuments. It is satisfactory 

 to be able to state that these marauders received the due 

 reward of their deeds at the battle of Ancrum Moor in the 

 following year, some of them, finding their last resting-place 

 in the forgiving embrace of the beautiful Church they had so 

 wantonly defaced. The Earl of Hertford, in September 1545, 

 wrecked the whole of the Border Abbeys, including Melrose ; 

 and it can hardly be supposed that any serious attempt at 

 restoration would follow. At the Reformation in 1560 the 

 revenues of the Abbey were annexed to the Crown, and 

 the splendid buildings left to the corroding tooth of time and 

 the cupidity of needy neighbours. 



"The plan of the Church is the usual cruciform one, the 



Eastern limb being extremely short and the 

 Architec- Western limb extremely long. The nave has 

 tural a very narrow aisle on the North side and a 



Features. wider one on the South, the latter flanked by 



a range of eight chapels. The architectural 

 choir has two bays only, but the ritual choir, as we shall 

 see, has extended across the transept and embraced three 

 baj's of the nave. The rood screen — apparently fifteenth 

 century work — is still tolerably entire. To the East of the 

 transept are the chapels of St. Stephen ou the North aud 



