About one hundred Irishmen still remained alive. They threw down their arms and asked for quarter. It was granted them; but for their wretched wives and children and the unarmed rabble of the camp there was no mercy. The horrid scene in Methven Wood was acted again, and they were slaughtered with every circumstance of the most inhuman brutality.[20] Nor was the bitterness of death past even for those who had trusted to Leslie's honour. On the morning after the battle they were brought out into the courtyard of Newark Castle and shot down in cold blood. On the march to Glasgow many prisoners were taken. Those of rank were reserved for trial. Eighty women and children, who had escaped the shambles at Philiphaugh, and were found wandering naked and half-starved among the hills, were flung in batches from the bridge at Linlithgow. Never, perhaps, was the indomitable energy of Montrose more signally manifested than at this tremendous crisis. Within four days after he had spurred in headlong flight over Minchmoor he was busy in Athole issuing orders and raising fresh levies for the King, as though the rout at Philiphaugh had been but an evil dream. The Napiers were still with him, and Airlie and Crawford with a few troopers. If Macdonald would bring his men back, if the Gordons could once more be stirred to action, the royal banner would soon wave over a fresh army in Scotland. And for a time things promised well. Macdonald, indeed, gave no sign; but the trusty Atholemen rose to the call, and with these Montrose hurried over the Grampians into the Gordons' country. Aboyne seemed to have shaken off his ill-humour, and joined him with a large muster of horse and foot. The enemy was divided. Middleton with the bulk of the cavalry lay at Turriff, watching Huntly who had again begun to show some signs of life; Leslie was still at Glasgow. It was to Glasgow that Montrose's hopes pointed; for there lay not only his most dangerous enemy but some of his dearest friends: the gallant Ogilvy, the good Spottiswoode, Nathaniel Gordon, and others, prisoners under sentence of an ignominious death. It were shame not to strike a blow for those who had never failed him. Duty, too, called him south as well as friendship. Glasgow lay between him and the Borders, and still, as ever, it was on the Borders that he looked for the King. Within less than a month Montrose, at the head of a stronger force than he had led into defeat at Philiphaugh, was once more on the march for the South.