Many severe accusations have been brought against Scotsmen, and especially Borderers, for their cruelty and inhumanity in time of war. It is perhaps possible to make good this indictment; but we do not believe that in regard to such matters the Scots were worse than their neighbours. And if they had great vices, they had also splendid virtues. They were brave, truthful, courteous, too ready perhaps to draw the sword on the slightest provocation, but as has been shown in the present instance, they were incapable of taking a mean advantage of a fallen foe. They loved fighting for its own sake, as well as for the sake of the "booty," but when the battle was over they cherished few resentments. The splendid qualities, physical and moral, so conspicuously brought to view in the battle of Otterburn cannot fail to suggest what a magnificent country Scotland might have become many centuries ago had she only been blessed with wise Kings and a strong Government. III. POOR AND LAWLESS. "Mountainous and strange is the country, And the people rough and savage." We have seen that the feeling of hatred to the English which prevailed on the Scottish Borders was due to some extent to the memory of the wrongs which the Borderers had suffered at the hands of their hereditary enemies. That this feeling had something to do with the existence and development of the reiving system, must be apparent to every student of history and of human nature. It was the most natural thing in the world that the dwellers on the Scottish Border should seek to retaliate; and as the forces at their command were seldom powerful enough to justify their engaging in open warfare, they resorted to the only other method of revenge which held out to them any hope of success.