64 Eeport of the Meetings for 1892. 



Duns Park was the place where the Scottish army assembled in 1318, 

 before the brilliant and successful assault on Berwick, under Randolph 

 and the Good Lord James Douglas. Barbour, in the eleventh book of his 

 well-known poem, tells us how King Robert laid his plans. 

 "At ewyn thow sail enbuschit be 



In Dwns Park ; bot be priuc. 



And I sail ger the erle Thomas, 



And the lord alsua of Douglas 



Athir with a sowme of men, 



Be thar to do as thow sail ken. 



The marchell (Keith) but mar dclny 



Tuk lave, and held furth on his way ; 



And held his spek priue and still, 



Quhill the day that wes set him till. 



Than of the best of Lothiane 



He hym till his tryst has tayne ; 



For schyrreff tharoff than wes he. 



To Dwns Park, with his menye, 



He come at evyn priuely. 



And syne with a gud cumpany 



Sone eftyr come the erle Thomas 



That wes met with the lord Dowglas. 



A rycht fayr cumpany thai war 



Qnhen thai war met to giddy r thar." 

 There is some reason to believe that the King himself was present at 

 the rendezvous, although he took no part in the actual attack. A 

 charter, under the Great Seal, in favour of Alexander the Seneschall, 

 bears that the lands conveyed— those of Kynbrigham (Kimmerghame) — 

 were resigned into the King's hands, in presence of his magnates, at the 

 Park of Dans.* The charter is undated, so that the point cannot be 

 conclusively settled; but we have ample evidence of the fact that Bruce 

 was at Duns more than once, in the decade that followed Bannockburn. 

 In the Calendar of Documents relating to Scotland, vol. in., p. 83, we find 

 the following entry : — " 1315, circa June 24. Rauf le fiz William and 

 Simon Wardc to the King. Inform him that the news from Cumberland 

 and Northumberland is that Sir Robert de Bruys is in the Park of Duns 

 collecting his host, either to attack the country towards York about the 

 quinzaine of St. John, or lay siege to Berwick." And in 1316 the Earl of 

 Moray granted "at the Park of Duns," in the King's presence, a charter 

 to the Monks of Newbottle of an annuity of 2 merks, payable from the 

 lands of Kingside. 



In the same reign Dominus Adam, Rector of Duns, and Nicholas de 



Duns, styled "our cleric," attest a charter by Patrick, Earl of Dunbar, 



confirming a charter by Thomas Randolph, Earl of Moray, of the lands of 



Redpath, in favour of the monastery of Melrose.f Nicholas de Duns is 



* Regist. Mag. Sig., Vol. i., pp. 3 and 4. 



t Liber de Melros, Vol. n., p. 389. 



