Borderers never hated their king, when he did not shorten their swords, or lengthen their necks. Amidst all their fighting and stealing, there was lurking in their hearts that spirit of chivalry which, surviving in their descendants, evolved, in the changes of time, into justice and order, adorned by sagacity and good manners. So it was that, when King James V. was a minor in the clutches of Angus, and Lennox could do nothing to get him at liberty, a number of the greater chieftains were on the side of the young prince, and among these the Scotts of Buccleugh and the Elliots of Stobs; but others, such as the Homes, and Kers, and Cockburns, were creatures of the Douglas; all the Borderland was divided into king's parties and Douglas' parties, and these again were partitioned into lesser rivalships, resulting from their personal feuds; so that it often happened that the lesser proprietors knew not what side to take, seeing their loyalty interfered with their revenge, or their revenge with their loyalty. In this way, as was said by a writer of the times, "a cow was greater than a king." Now the Laird of Darnick was, as we have said, thinking of these things in his tower of Darnick. "My father fell at the red Flodden," he said, meditatively, "and our house has ever been a loyal one. If we joined in a foray among the green fields of Wells or Harden, or took one upon our own account, it was only what we had a right to do, by the laws of the Borders, older, I ween, than those of Edinburgh or Scone. For what other purpose has the bull upon our crest his horns, if not to show that we had a courage to maintain, and which, thank God, has never been disgraced by an inhabitant of this old peel. By my crest! I love this young James Stewart as well as I love a Scott, or hate a Douglas, and I will away to meet him on his journey from Jedburgh to Melrose." And, calling together his retainers and all those who looked upon the old tower as a rallying point, and these having got their shaggy garrons, and as good equipments of shining rippons as they could muster, they set out upon their journey, viewing, as they went along, the rich pasturing places, to count how many sirloins they could turn out, when a good riever was hungry, and was not forgetful of himself while he was mindful of his king and his old country. They arrived in happy time to join the cavalcade, and the eyes of the Laird of Darnick were blessed with the sight of the young prince, though he was the son of the imprudent king who led the last Laird of Darnick to his death at Flodden. "But where is Wat Scott?" he asked at many among the royal party; "where is he who should be here with his strong arm and his sword, to show his master the kind of man he has in those parts to help him in his need against the Douglas, who holds him in a leash, and leads him about his own kingdom as if he were a dog, to show his breed and his fine collar."