The little King James, a precocious and clever child like all the infantile monarchs of the house of Stewart, had been established at Stirling, always a favourite residence of the Scotch Kings, where he held his baby Court in peace while his mother pined in England, and the Scotch lords struggled for the mastery, and succeeded each other as Regents at home. The troubles of the world outside seem to have been kept far from the surroundings of the boy, to whom both the kingdoms looked as their heir, the child in whom the glories of his race came to a climax, and the union of the warring kingdoms was at last secured. Personally, he was by far the least distinguished of his name, but no one as yet suspected this fact or thought of Buchanan's pupil as less hopeful than any of the gallant Jameses who had preceded him. The little Court at Stirling was presided over at this early period by the Lady Mar, a dignified matron who was "wise and sharp and kept the king in great awe," although at the same time very tender of the child and respectful of his royal dignity. Almost all James's immediate surroundings seem to have belonged to this powerful race. The master of the household was a certain Laird of Drumwhasel, to whom no other name is given, and who is described as ambitious and greedy, a man whose "greatest care was to advance himself and his friends." Alexander Erskine, another member of the household, calls forth something like enthusiasm in the courtly narrative as "a gallant, well-nurtured gentleman, loved and honoured by all men for his good qualities and great discretion, no ways factious nor envious, a lover of all honest men, desiring to see men of good conversation about the prince rather than his own nearest friends if he found them not so meet." In addition to this official household were the tutors charged with James's education, two of them being members of the Erskine family, abbots of Cambuskenneth and Dryburgh, though those titles were no doubt merely fictitious, meaning only that the "temporalities," the endowments of the extinct monasteries, were in their hands. The other and principal masters of James were Sir Peter Young and Mr. George Buchanan. Young was "gentle, loth to offend the king at any time, carrying himself warily as a man who had a mind to his own weal by keeping of his majesty's favour"--"but Mr. George," adds the historian, "was a Stoick philosopher who looked not far before him." He "held the king in great awe," so that James "even trembled" as he himself says elsewhere, "at his approach," and did not spare either rod or word in the interests of his pupil. Some of the anecdotes of this severe impartiality are amusing enough. At one time annoyed by the noise which the King and his playfellows were making, Buchanan bade them be silent under certain penalties if the offence were repeated, and provoked by a childish impertinence from James, took up the little culprit and whipped him with exemplary