The vulture still will whet the thirsty beak- As wild as when he roam'd in chainless pride. Nor the black robe nor white, nor cowl-clad head, JAMES THE FIFTH. BORN 1512- DIED 1542. JAMES THE FIFTH was born at the palace | king in such restraint as induced him to make of Linlithgow in the month of April, 1512. When the fatal field of Flodden numbered among its victims the chivalrous James IV., his successor, the infant prince, was not a year and a half old. Among those who had charge of his education was the celebrated Sir David Lindsay of the Mount, and John Bellenden, the translator of Boethius' History. The works of both authors abound with passages referring to the share which they had in the formation of the young sovereign's character. seem that to the poet the task had chiefly fallen of attending the prince in his hours of amusement. In his Complaint" he says his escape from the palace of Falkland when in his seventeenth year, and take refuge in Stirling Castle, the residence of his mother. By the most vigorous measures the king now proceeded to repress disorders and punish crime throughout the kingdom. Attended by a numerous retinue, under the pretence of enjoying the pleasures of hunting, he visited various districts, executing thieves and marauders, and caused the laws to be obeyed on every foot It would of Scottish soil. The most memorable of his "And ay quhen thou came from the schule, Then I behufft to play the fule." It is to the happy influence of Sir David Lindsay that we may ascribe a large share of that regard for justice, that taste for literature and art, and that love of poetry, music, and romance for which the young Scottish king became distinguished. In his twelfth year the nobles, tired of the state of misrule into which Scotland had been brought, and of the dissensions among themselves, requested James to assume the government. His power, however, was merely nominal, as four guardians were appointed, by whom the whole authority of the state was exercised in his name. The Earl of Angus, victims was the noted borderer Johnnie Armstrong, who was summarily hanged with his twenty-four followers, "quhilk," says Pitscottie, "monie Scottisman heavilie lamented, for he was ane doubtit man and als guid ane chieftain as evir was upon the borderis aither of Scotland or England." In 1535 James proceeded to France upon a matrimonial expedition, and married Magdalene, eldest daughter of the French king, who died of consumption within forty days of her arrival in Scotland. He afterwards espoused Mary of Guise. A rupture with Henry VIII. led to the battle of Solway Moss, one of the most inglorious engagements in Scottish annals. The command of the army having been con ferred on Oliver Sinclair, a favourite of the king, the high-spirited and discontented nobles indignantly refused to obey such a leader, and were in consequence easily defeated by an When the tidings of this one of these, soon obtained the ascendency inferior force. over his colleagues, and he held the young disaster reached James he was frantic with grief and mortification. Hastening to Edin- | inferior fame, were among the men of letters burgh, he shut himself up for a week, and who contributed to shed a lustre on his reign, then passed over to Falkland, where he took and who, in an age when there was no reading to his bed. Meantime the queen had given public, could live on the patronage of the birth to a daughter, afterwards the beautiful court alone. To gratify a strong passion for but unfortunate Mary Queen of Scots. On adventures of a romantic character James being informed of this event he said, "It came would often roam through the country in diswith a lass, and it will go with a lass," deem- guise under the soubriquet of "The Gudeman ing it another misfortune that it was not a of Ballangeich." He is believed to be the male heir. A little before his death, which author of the well-known and popular ballads occurred previous to the 13th of December, of "The Gaberlunzie Man" and "The Jollie 1542, when he was but thirty-one years of age, Beggar," both founded on his own adventures. he was heard muttering the words "Solway Sir Walter Scott said of the last-mentioned, Moss," the scene of that disaster which hurried that it was the best comic ballad in any lanhim to an early grave. The love of justice guage. George Chalmers and some other endeared the lamented monarch to the people, authorities have attributed other productions who conferred on him the title of King of to the pen of the commons' king, but it is the Poor." Other princes have been called thought without sufficient evidence. The great and bold and mighty, but it was the far two songs attributed to James V. are both pronobler pride of James to be styled THE KING ductions of great merit-remarkable for their OF THE POOR. roguish humour and freedom of expression. albeit they are rather broad for the last half of the nineteenth century: Of the elegant and useful arts, and of all branches of what was called profane learning, he was a liberal patron and active promoter. "He furnished the countrie," says Pitscottie, "with all kyndis of craftismen, sik as Frenchmen, Spainyardis, and Dutchmen, quhilk ever wes the finest of thair professioun that culd be had; quhilk brought the countrie to great policie." Lindsay, Buchanan, Bellenden, Maitland, Montgomery, and many others of "Old times are changed, old manners gone." Yet no change of manners or evolutions of time will much affect poetry which is founded in nature; and this makes the lyrics of James as fresh and lively and intelligible as they were more than three hundred years ago, when they were composed by the young king. THE GABERLUNZIE-MAN. The pawky auld carle came o'er the lee, Will you lodge a silly poor man? O wow! quo' he, were I as free And I wad never think lang. And O, quo' he, an' ye were as black And awa' wi' me thou shou'd gang. And awa' wi' thee I wou'd gang. Between the twa was made a plot; And fast to the bent are they gane. To speer for the silly poor man. She gaed to the bed where the beggar lay; For some of our gear will be gane! The servant gaed where the daughter lay, She's aff with the gaberlunzie man. O fy gar ride, and fy gar rin, The wearifu' gaberlunzie man. Cut frae a new cheese a whang O kend my minny I were wi' you, After the gaberlunzie man. And carry the gaberlunzie on. Wi' cauk and keel I'll win your bread, To carry the gaberlunzie on. THE JOLLY BEGGAR. There was a jollie beggar, And a begging he was boun, And he took up his quarters Into a landart town: Nor wad he in the byre, And we'll go no more a roving, Let the moon shine e'er so bright. The beggar's bed was made at e'en, 'Twas there the beggar lay. And we'll go no more a roving, And the moon shine e'er so bright. He took the lassie in his arms, O hoolie, hoolie wi' me, sir, And ne'er a word he spak- And we'll go no more a roving, A roving in the night, Save when the moon is moving, Have ye ony dogs about this toun, And what wad ye do wi' them, O dool for the doing o't, Are ye the poor man? And we'll go no more a roving, A roving in the night, Nor sit a sweet maid loving Then up she gat the meal-powks, And flang them o'er the wa', The deil gae wi the meal powks My maiden fame and a'; I took ye for some gentleman, At least the laird o' Brodie O dool for the doing o't, Are ye the poor bodie? And we'll go no more a roving, He took the lassie in his arms, He took a wee horn frae his side, And blew baith loud and shrill, And we'll go no more a roving, Nor sit a sweet maid loving And he took out his little knife, And we'll ay gang a roving, ALEXANDER MONTGOMERY. BORN 1540 DIED 1614. (?) of his compositions is styled "The Flyting between Montgomerie and Polwart," which is written after the manner of the "Flyting of Dunbar and Kennedie." He is also the author of "The Minde's Melodie," consisting of paraphrases of the Psalms, and a great variety of sonnets. Among the books presented by Drum mond of Hawthornden to the University of Edinburgh is a manuscript collection of the poems of Montgomery, consisting of odes, occurred between 1597 and 1615, in which latter year an edition of his "Cherrie and Slae" was printed by Andrew Hart. Editions of his poetical works were published in 1751 and 1754; and in 1822 a complete edition, with a biographical preface by Dr. Irving, was issued in Edinburgh, under the superintendence of David Laing. ALEXANDER MONTGOMERY, known as a poet in 1568, is supposed to have been a younger son of Montgomery of Hazlehead Castle, in Ayrshire. Of his personal history there are no authentic memorials. In his poem entitled "The Navigatioun," he calls himself "ane German born." Dempster describes him as "Eques Montanus vulgo vocatus;” but is certain that he was never knighted. In the titles to his works he is styled Captain, and it has been conjectured that he was an officer in the body-sonnets, psalms, and epitaphs. His death guard of the Regent Morton. Melville in his Diary mentions him about 1577 as "Captain Montgomery, a good honest man, and the regent's domestic." His poetical talents secured him the friendship of James VI., from whom he received a pension. In the king's "Reulis and Cautelis to be observit and eschewit in Scottish Poesie," published in 1584, his majesty quotes some of Montgomery's poems as examples of the different styles of His best known production is his allegorical poem of "The Cherrie and the Slae," on which Allan Ramsay formed the model of his "Vision," and to one particular passage in which he was indebted for his description of the Genius of Caledonia. It was first published in 1595, and reprinted two years later by Robert Waldegrave, "according to a copie corrected by the author himselfe." Another verse. An eminent critic says of Montgomery, that he "deserves more notice than he has obtained; he was long spoken of, but seldom read; and I am willing to believe that the fortunate abuse of Pinkerton contributed to his fame, by arming in his behalf all the lovers of old Seottish song. The cast of his genius is lyrical: there is a sweetness and a liquid motion about even his most elaborate productions, and one cannot easily avoid chanting many passages on perusal. His thoughts are ready, his images at hand, and his illustrations natural and play of scholarship was less affected then than apt. His language is ever flowing, felicitous, it would be now. To glance, as the stream of and abundant. His faults are the faults of story flows along, at old glory and at ancient the times. Printing had opened the treasures things, is very well when happily managed of ancient lore; and all our compositions were and not dwelt upon; but Venus can only come speckled and spotted with classical allusions. into courtships now to be laughed at, and the He embalms conceits in a stream of melody, most reasonable god in all the mythology will and seeks to consecrate anew the faded splen- | abate rather than increase the interest of any dour of the heathen mythology. Such dis- | living poet's song." THE CHERRIE AND THE SLAE. About an bank with balmy bewis, Quhen Philomel had sweitly sung, How Tereus cut out hir tung, Quilk story so sorie To schaw hir self scho semit, To heir hir so neir hir, I doubtit if I dreimit. The cushat crouds, the corbie crys, The turtle wails on witherit treis, I saw the hurcheon and the hare Sum feiding, sum dreiding The air was sobir, saft, and sweit, The quhilk lyke silver schaikers shynd, Quhairwith their heavy heids declynd, Sum knoping, sum droping, Methocht an heavenlie heartsum thing, Owre twinkling all the treis, Quhairof sum sweitest honie socht, To stay thair lyves frae sterve, NIGHT IS NIGH GONE. Hey, now the day's dawning; |