match and ball, for every fencible person within their district. It was at this time, too, that the first Act dealing with desertion from the army was passed. It gave strict injunctions to the Colonels and Committees of War to apprehend all those, both of horse and foot, who ran away from their colours, and empowered them, if they thought it expedient for the good of the army, to "decimate the fugitives, and cause hang the tenth man". If there were less than ten offenders, one might still be put to death, "for terrifying others"; and if there were only one, he might be made to suffer the extreme penalty. Milder legislation originated at this time, too. It was in 1645 that an Act "in favour of lamed soldiers" promised maintenance upon the public charges to all who were so hurt and wounded in the defence of the public cause as to be unfit for their ordinary employment; and that another appointed a Committee to devise measures for the relief of the widows and orphans of those who fell. And so anxious were the Estates that their good faith should not be doubted, that they pledged the honour of the kingdom in proof of it. From this point, the story of the Scots army merges into that of the civil wars of the period. And to relate it further would be to recapitulate what general histories of Scotland have already made more or less familiar to all. FOOTNOTES: for THE OLD SCOTTISH ARMY [278] _Act Parl._, vol. i, Coll. Frag., p. 752. [279] It has been suggested that _Christis Kirk of the Grene_, being "a jocund skit upon the ludicrous incapacity of the Scottish rustic to handle a bow", may have been intended "to fortify the statutes of law by the aids of ridicule and satire" (Ross, _Early Scottish History and Literature_). [280] _Act Parl._, vol. ii, p. 8. [281] _Act Parl._, vol. ii, p. 10. [282] _Act Parl._, vol. ii, p. 45. [283] _Act Parl._, vol. ii, p. 48. [284] _Act Parl._, vol. ii, p. 100. [285] _Act Parl._, vol. ii, p. 346. [286] This was in accordance with the very first of the instructions embodied in the Bruce's "Testament", those fourteen lines of which Mr. Oman says that they "contain all the principles on which the Scots, when well advised, acted for the next two hundred and fifty years". "On fut suld be all Scottis weire, By hyll and mosse themselff to reare. Lat woods for wallis be bow and speire, That innymeis do them na deire. In strait placis gar keip all store, And byrnen ye planeland thaim before. Thane sall thai pass away in haist When that thai find na thing but waist. With wyles and waykings of the nyght And mekill noyis maid on hytht, Thaim sall ye turnen with gret affrai, As thai ware chassit with swerd away. This is the consall and intent Of gud King Robert's testiment." [287] _Reg. Priv. Coun._, vol. i, p. 62. [288] "Victual" is the old Scots term for grain of any kind. [289] _Reg. Priv. Coun._, sub. ann. cit. [290] _Reg. Priv. Coun._, sub. ann. cit. THE STORY OF THE "LONG-TAIL" MYTH