Three of these were indeed the vessels of Howard, who, when on his homeward voyage, had been joined off Holy Island by two large armed vessels, under Miles Furnival, sent by Henry VII. from the Thames, with orders to pillage the coast of Scotland, and (in fulfilment of the old and invariable policy of the English kings) to take every advantage of the intestine broils of Scotland to distress and harass the people, that they might the more willingly listen to his proposals, when the project of the prince's marriage with Margaret Tudor was revived--a foolish and mistaken policy, as the Scots were ever the last people in the world to be wooed by cold steel and gunpowder. Feeling appetised after his long ride, Sir Patrick's messenger reined up his foam-flecked charger at the _Dunbar Arms_, an hostel in the Highgate, where he ordered a cup of Malvoisie, a pair of roasted plovers, and a quail, with sweet sack, for he felt able to devour a horse, after his long ride near the seacoast; and he resolved, that though the evening was drawing on, affairs of state should wait his pleasure. "How happy are the rich," thought he, with a sigh of enjoyment, after he had drained the last of his sack, and picked the last bone of the quail; "how often have I fed my hopes when I had little wherewith to feed my stomach," he added, clinking the English gold pieces, with which his purse was now so well lined, and which went current in Scotland, as Scottish coins did in England, for then the coin of all nations was circulated everywhere; "but this country will grow too hot for me ere long, so I must e'en turn spy on Henry, and win in England the lyons, louis, and angels of the new king, James IV.--ugh!" and he smiled a ferocious smile, "he owes his crown to _me_! But now to reach these devilish ships anent that damsel, who I would with all my soul was sleeping with her fathers." He now went on foot to the harbour, where, though the sea was calm, there was considerable agitation in the water, for Dunbar is the most bleak and stormy headland on the coast; but he found that no money would tempt the fishermen to put him on board of any of those English vessels, which were lying, almost becalmed, about two miles off; and he soon ceased to ask them, as their suspicions were readily excited, and there were not a few who threatened to drag him before the provost, that he might be forced to "declare what manner of business he, a Scot, had on board these hostile craft." This threat made him tremble, for now he had three tenements in Stirling, with a remarkably well-lined purse; and if "the sudden possession of gold will make a brave man cautious," how much more so will it render timid a dastardly regicide?