More romance is associated in the popular mind of Scotland with the career of James the Fifth than with that of any other of the romantic race of Stuart, except perhaps the last of the line, the hero of the ’45. For three centuries stories of the amours and escapades of “the Gudeman of Ballengeich” have formed the familiar tradition of the countryside; his exploits have been the subject of innumerable songs, ballads, and minstrel lays, from “The Jolly Beggar” itself, to “The Lady of the Lake”; and even at the present day the eye of a Scotsman kindles with lively reminiscence; at mention of the kindly “King of the Commons.”

Son of that gallant James who fell at Flodden, and of Margaret, the hot-blooded sister of Henry VIII., he might have been predicted to make for himself a life more eventful than that of most men. His time, besides, fell at a crisis in Scottish history—the meeting of the counter currents of the old order and the new in the Reformation. Whatever the causes, the fact remains that from his birth at Linlithgow on 10th April, 1512, till his death at Falkland on 14th December, 1542, the career of James V. presents a continuous series of personal episodes as dramatic as anything on the historic stage. Dating his reign from the most tragic disaster in Scottish history, he was crowned King of Scotland before he could speak, a month after his father’s death on the battlefield. Smiled on by the Muses in his cradle, his childish gambols have been made a sunny picture for all time by the verses of his childhood’s companion, one of the greatest of the national poets. Invested with the sceptre at twelve years of age, at sixteen he suddenly astonished his enemies by proving that he could wield it, making himself at one stroke and in a few hours absolute master of Scotland.

Nothing, perhaps, shows one side of the character of James—his decision, daring, and resolute energy—better than the transaction of the night in May, 1528, when, slipping the Douglas leash at Falkland, he galloped through the defiles of the Ochils with Jockie Hart, and appeared at once as unquestioned king among his nobles at Stirling. As energetic, however, and almost as dramatic were the young monarch’s measures for restoring order in his disordered realm. Under the Douglas usurpation every abuse had been rampant, might had everywhere overridden right, and outrage had everywhere scorched the land with sorrow and fire. Such a state of things was only to be righted by an iron hand, and if the acts of James have sometimes appeared severe to modern eyes, there can be no doubt that severity was needed. In particular, the young king’s descent upon the Border has been remembered in story and song.[743] Shutting up the Border lords beforehand in Edinburgh, he swept suddenly through Ettrick Forest, Eskdale, and Teviotdale, surprising freebooters like Cockburn of Henderland, Scott of Tushielaw, and Johnnie Armstrong, in their own fastnesses, and by the execution of swift, sharp justice reduced these lawless regions forthwith to tranquillity. Rebellions in the Orkneys and the Western Isles were quelled with tact and promptitude; the attempts of the Douglases upon the marches were met and defeated by superior force, and the insidious approaches of Henry VIII. were checkmated by sending a force of seven thousand Highlanders over seas to assist O’Donnel, the Irish chief, in his efforts to shake off the English yoke.

One incident in the life of James illustrates vividly the spirit of extravagant devotion which the character of the Stuarts from first to last seems to have been capable of exciting in their followers. During a royal progress through his dominions the young king was entertained by the Earl of Athole in a sumptuous palace of wood erected for the occasion on a meadow at the foot of Ben y Gloe. Hung with tapestries of silk and gold, and lit by windows of stained glass, this palace, surrounded by a moat and by towers of defence in the manner of a feudal castle, lodged the king more luxuriously than any of his own residences. Yet on the departure of the royal cavalcade the Earl, declaring that the palace which had lodged the sovereign should never be profaned by accommodating a subject, to the astonishment of the Papal legate who was present, ordered the whole fabric, with all that it contained, to be given to the flames.

It was at this period of his life that James engaged in most of those romantic adventures by which, under his assumed name of “the Gudeman of Ballengeich,” he is popularly remembered. He was as fearless as he was energetic, and upon tidings of misdeeds, however remote, he made no hesitation in getting instantly on horseback and spurring at the head of his small personal retinue to attack and punish the evil-doers. In these excursions he constantly shared extreme perils and privations with his followers. These and the perils of his too frequent intrigues with the fair daughters of his subjects form the burden of most of the traditions current regarding him. One of the most characteristic of these traditions is preserved by Scott in his Tales of a Grandfather, was used by the great romancist for the plot of “The Lady of the Lake,” and forms the subject of the favourite drama of “Cramond Brig.” Another, hardly less dramatic and amusing, also preserved by Scott, is that of James’s turning the tables upon Buchanan of Arnpryor, the bold “King of Kippen.”

None of his adventures, however, surpasses in romantic incident the weightier matter of the king’s own marriage. In the hope of withdrawing Scotland from the support of France in the great continental rivalry then going on, the Emperor Charles V. had in turn offered James alliance with his sister, the Queen of Hungary, his niece the daughter of the King of Denmark, and with a second niece the Princess Mary of Portugal; while Henry VIII. had offered his own daughter Mary to the young monarch. In one case the whole of Norway was offered by way of dowry. But James had a mind of his own on the subject, and was not to be tempted from the ancient policy of the country. Sir David Lyndsay was accordingly despatched to arrange a marriage with the daughter of the Duc de VendÔme, the head of the princely house of Bourbon. The treaty was all but concluded, when suddenly, among the attendants of some nobles freshly arrived from Scotland, the princess recognised James himself. Irking at his envoy’s delay he had hit upon this device for forming personal acquaintance with his bride, but his identity was betrayed by a portrait which he had previously sent her. For eight days he was sumptuously entertained by the Bourbons, but, dissatisfied in some way with the choice which had been made for him, he formed an excuse to visit the court of Francis I. There he fell in love with the king’s eldest daughter, the fragile Princess Magdalene. She, it appears, became also passionately attached to him, and, notwithstanding all obstacles—the warnings of the physicians and the reluctance of Francis to expose his daughter to an inhospitable climate, the two were married on 1st January, 1537, and after four months of rejoicings and utmost happiness sailed for Scotland. The gallant fleet of fifty ships sailed up the Firth of Forth on the 28th of May, and it is narrated that as she landed to pass to Holyrood the fair young queen stooped down and kissed the soil of her husband’s country.

This romantic method of royal match-making, however, must be considered to have cost James dear. His continued absence from the country had left room for the machinations of his enemies; his previous good fortune seemed, upon his return, to fail him; and worst of all, amid the increasing troubles of the time he seems to have been oppressed by a certain foreboding.

Forty days after landing, and while preparations were being made for her triumphal progress through the country, the seventeen-year-old queen died. “And,” says Lindsay of Pitscottie, “the king’s heavy moan that he made for her was greater than all the rest.” A second marriage, it is true, was, for political reasons, and with the approval of Francis, forthwith arranged for James, and in the summer of 1538 Marie, daughter of the Duc de Guise, was received with gallant display by her royal consort at St. Andrews. But three months later, news arrived from France that the daughter of the Duc de VendÔme had sickened of her disappointment, and was dead. “Quhairat,” to quote Pitscottie again, “when the King of Scotland got wit, he was highlie displeased (distressed), thinkand that he was the occasion of that gentlewoman’s death also.”

Meanwhile the intrigues of Henry VIII. and the banished Douglases had succeeded in corrupting a great part of the Scottish nobility. Twice was the life of James attempted; first by the Master of Forbes, a brother-in-law of the Earl of Angus, and next by Angus’s sister, Janet Douglas, Lady Glammis. With envious eyes and diminishing loyalty the Scottish nobles saw the English peers enriched by Henry’s distribution of the confiscated church lands, while James consistently refused to carry out the same plan of spoliation in Scotland. The climax of the young king’s troubles was reached in 1542. Hitherto Henry VIII., in his designs upon the independence of the northern kingdom, had confined himself to the arts of policy and bribery, suborning the trusted servants of the crown, and embroiling James between the rights of the church and the ambition of the nobles. Now, however, the time seemed ripe, and he sent the English forces openly across the Border. These were met and routed with courage and promptitude; and, overjoyed at his success, the Scottish king had made full preparations for retaliating, and was marching south at the head of his army, when at Fala his nobles suddenly refused to carry war into England, and forced him to abandon the campaign. This dishonour before his people, followed immediately by the disgraceful rout of a Scottish army at Solway Moss, broke the gallant young monarch’s heart. To add to his sorrows his two infant sons had died within a short time of each other. Upon hearing of the destruction of his troops he shut himself up in the palace of Falkland, where, overwhelmed with grief and despair, he sank under a burning fever. One hope still sustained him: the birth of an heir to the throne was hourly expected. On the 7th of December news arrived that the queen had been safely delivered. To the king’s eager question the messenger replied that the infant was “ane fair dochter.” “Is it so?” said James; “Fairweill! The crown cam with a lass, and it will gang with a lass.” Whereupon, in the quaint words of Pitscottie, “he commendit himselff to the Almightie God, and spak litle from thensforth, bot turned his back to his lords and his face to the wall.” On the 14th of December he passed away.

There exists an interesting description of James from the pen of Ronsard, who accompanied the queen from France and was a servant at the Scottish court.

Not yet thirty-one years of age at his death, and notwithstanding the corrupting influences to which in early youth he had been purposely exposed by the Douglases, James had shown himself a noble and active prince. Had he gone with the tide and consented to gratify his courtiers with the plunder of the monasteries, like Henry VIII., his reign might have been less troubled and his memory less maligned by interested historians. He has been chiefly accused of an unrelenting severity towards members of the house of Douglas, and of cruelty in assenting to the death of Lady Glammis. Buchanan’s assertion, however, of the innocence of this lady, though followed by many historians, has been sufficiently answered by Tytler;[744] and James’s consistent refusal to show favour to the Douglases can be blamed by no one who takes into consideration the king’s early treatment by that house, the insult and ravage with which they met his assumption of power, their persistent attempts to undermine his authority and take his life, and the final success which, by his death in the prime of manhood, finally crowned their efforts. Like his ancestor, the first of his name, James succeeded for a time in making “the bush keep the cow” in Scotland, and had he only been moderately supported by those who should have been his lieutenants, there can be no doubt that he would presently have made his realm a model of just administration. As it is, his reign must be honourably remembered for what he accomplished in this direction, and for the wise laws which he made for the restraint of feudal violence. A monument of his administrative power exists in the establishment of the College of Justice, which, under the name of the Court of Session, remains the supreme tribunal of Scotland to the present day.

But there is reason for believing that James the Fifth left evidence of genius in another field. Drummond of Hawthornden in his History (p. 346) states that “James V. was naturally given to poesie, as many of his works yet extant testifie.” Bellenden in his prologue to Livy thus addresses the king:

And one of Lyndsay’s poems, the “Answer maid to the Kingis Flyting” leaves no doubt on the subject. The writer begins by stating that he has read the monarch’s “ragment,” and he ends with a compliment on the royal verse:

The fame of James V.’s poetical talents is even understood to have spread as far as Italy, and to have led to his mention by Ariosto.[745]

Four separate poems attributed to James are extant at the present day—“Peblis to the Play,” “Christis Kirk on the Grene,” “The Gaberlunzieman,” and “The Jolly Beggar.” The authorship of the last two of these has at no time been seriously questioned. The authenticity of “Peblis to the Play” and “Christis Kirk,” however, has been the subject of considerable debate, some critics assigning these two poems to James the First. The evidence on both sides may be briefly stated.

John Mair, who wrote his history De Gestis Scotorum in 1518, states that James I., among his other compositions, wrote a pleasant and skilful song, “At Beltayn,” which, since the original was inaccessible, certain persons had sought to counterfeit. It happens that the opening stanza of “Peblis to the Play” begins with “At Beltane.” This, with the fact of the poem’s mention in “Christis Kirk,” forms the chief plea for attributing “Peblis to the Play” to James I. Next, the earliest known copy of “Christis Kirk,” that in the Bannatyne MS. (1568), is subscribed “Quod K. James the First.” This is the only external evidence for ascribing the poem to that monarch. On the other hand, by those who dispute the authorship of James I., the slightness of Mair’s evidence regarding “Peblis to the Play,” and the presumption of Bannatyne’s blundering regarding “Christis Kirk,” have been dwelt upon. “At Beltayn,” it is remarked, was in the sixteenth century, by Mair’s own statement, a hackneyed opening to a poem; while, as for Bannatyne’s colophon, it is pointed out that in the title of the next poem but one in his collection he writes “James the Fyift,” or as some read it, “the Fyrst,” in mistake for James the Fourth, and he may have made a similar error in regard to “Christis Kirk.” In support of this view it is asserted[746] that by common tradition, previous to the discovery of the Bannatyne MS., these poems were invariably attributed to James V.; and this assertion is supported by the usage of the early writers, Dempster in the beginning of the seventeenth century, Bishop Gibson in 1691, and James Watson in 1706. The authority of these writers, however, no less than that of common tradition, has in turn been questioned by the supporters of the claim of James I.,[747] and it has been pointed out that in Maitland’s MS. (1585) no name is appended to “Peblis to the Play,” an omission which, it is suggested, could hardly have occurred had Maitland known James V. to be the author. But again, in support of James V. it may reasonably be urged that the important poem of “Christis Kirk” is mentioned in their histories neither by Mair nor by Bellenden when dealing with James I.; that that king is not even mentioned among the makars by Dunbar in his famous “Lament”; that none of the four poems is to be found in the MS. of John Asloan, written before James V.’s time, in 1515; and that while Lyndsay in his earlier composition, the prologue to the “Papyngo,” in 1530,[748] makes no mention of James I. as a reputed author, in 1538, in his “Justyng betuix Watsoun and Barbour,” he pays “Christis Kirk” the compliment of copying several conspicuous expressions,[749] the natural inference being that “Christis Kirk” was not composed before the former year. On the whole, therefore, the external evidence may be considered almost evenly balanced. The internal evidence is somewhat more delicate.

The familiarity with peasant manners and character which both poems display had been made much of as an argument. This, however, can be held to prove nothing, since both James I. and James V. are said to have had the habit of wandering among their subjects in disguise. Neither can the language of the compositions be taken as of much account. The more antique words, as in the expressions, “Ye sall pay at ye aucht,” “He hydis tyt,” and “On thame swyth,” are paralleled by James V.’s contemporaries, Douglas and Lyndsay, and probably lingered late in the use of the common people whom the poems describe; while, on the other hand, more modern words, like “ane,” “quha” (in the sense of “who”),[750] “began,” and “happenis” (halfpence), which might be used to support the claims of James V., may be accounted for by changes introduced in transcription. An ingenious argument has been adduced from the use, or rather misuse of archery in “Christis Kirk.”[751] James I., it appears, upon his return from captivity, made a law compelling the constant practice of the bow; and it has been suggested that that king, wishing to fortify the statutes of law by the aid of ridicule, wrote the poem as a satire upon the clumsiness of the Scottish peasantry in the use of the weapon. The same critics aver further that archery had become obsolete in the time of James V., hagbut and arquebus having taken its place. The argument, however, appears somewhat conjectural. According to Barbour’s Bruce the bow was one of the chief Scottish weapons of war from the earliest times, and an island in Loch Lomond still bears the yew-trees said to have been planted by King Robert for its supply; while so late as the time of Queen Mary the bow remained a favourite weapon in the field of sport, if not in the field of battle.[752] A serious obstacle in the way of attributing these poems to James I. has been pointed out by Professor Skeat in the lateness of their style and metre. He remarks, as an instance, that in stanza 19 of “Peblis to the Play” we find stokks rhymed with ox, whereas in the time of James I. the plural of stok was stokkis.[753] Further, he remarks, “It will be found by no means easy to point out any undoubted example of the use of the rollicking metre (of these poems) anterior to the year 1450; whereas James I. died in 1437.” Another point might be made of the fact that poems of this burlesque description seem to have been greatly in vogue about James V.’s time. It is enough to cite “The Tournament of Tottenham” printed by Percy, Dunbar’s “Justis betuix the Tailyour and the Sowtar,” Lyndsay’s “Justing betuix James Watsoun and Jhone Barbour,” and Scot’s “Justing at the Drum.” The most cogent argument, however, should naturally be one derived from the general tone of the poems. On this point one writer, Guest, in his English Rhythms, has said, “One can hardly suppose those critics serious who attribute this song (‘Christis Kirk’) to the moral and sententious James I.”; and Professor Skeat has added that “while there is no resemblance to ‘The Kingis Quair’ discoverable (in these poems), there is a marked dissimilarity in the tone, in the vocabulary, and in the metre.” On the other hand, it is to be observed that the style and strain of humour, both of “Peblis to the Play” and of “Christis Kirk,” resemble as closely as possible those of “The Gaberlunzieman” and “The Jolly Beggar,” which have always been attributed to James V., while they are also in entire keeping with what is known of the actual humour and temper of that king.

Absolute proof of the authorship, it must be admitted, is wanting, but upon the whole the available evidence appears to favour James V.; the majority of the critics, from Warton and Ritson to Stopford Brooke, have favoured this view; and, to quote Sibbald, “it appears safer in this instance to trust to vulgar tradition than to the ipse dixit of Bannatyne, who seems to have had but an indistinct notion of our different kings of the name of James.”

The earliest and best copy of “Christis Kirk on the Grene” is that contained in Bannatyne’s MS., now made available by the Hunterian Club. The poem is also contained in the Maitland MS., from which it was printed by Pinkerton in his Ancient Scottish Poems (Appendix II., 444). “Peblis to the Play” is also contained in the Maitland folio, and was printed from it by Pinkerton in his Select Scottish Ballads in 1783. Of both poems there have been many other editions. Most of these, however, contain texts very much corrupted, and none of the editors except Pinkerton appears to have seen the Maitland MS. “The Gaberlunzieman” and “The Jolly Beggar” have shared the haphazard fortune of their sister compositions, and in their case it is more difficult to ascertain a standard text. All four pieces are printed in the Perth edition of “The Works of James I.”, 1786, though the editor mentions that “The Gaberlunzieman” and “The Jolly Beggar” are commonly ascribed to James V. In the present volume “The Gaberlunzieman” follows the text given in Percy’s Reliques of Ancient English Poetry, while “The Jolly Beggar” follows that in Ritson’s Scottish Songs.

“Christis Kirk” has for several hundred years been one of the most popular of Scottish poems. Dr. Irving cites as a proof of its fame and popularity in the eighteenth century the lines of Pope:

As an illustration of ancient rustic humour and a description of low manners in its time it remains perhaps the best thing in the language. The only composition which competes with it for the first place in its class is the “Jolly Beggars” of Robert Burns. The two additional cantos which Allan Ramsay wrote for it in no way approach the spontaneity and boisterous energy of the original poem.

“Peblis to the Play” deals with a similar subject in similar manner, and has generally been considered to possess less merit than “Christis Kirk.” It certainly falls short of the riotous uproar of its companion piece, and beats the air throughout with a gentler wing; but its touches describing traits of rustic character are not less deft, the humour is here and there of a tenderer sort, and the subject displays more variety. The poem presents an admirable picture of the day’s enjoyment of rustic lads and lasses at a country fair, and is not the less artistic for its touch of rustic pathos near the end.

“The Gaberlunzieman” and “The Jolly Beggar” are said by tradition to celebrate two of James V.’s own adventures with country girls. It must be acknowledged that they are quite in keeping with the legends current regarding the too gallant monarch. One such tradition, recorded by Percy, narrates how the king used to visit a smith’s daughter at Niddry, near Edinburgh; but it is not known whether the intrigue with her had any connection with either of the poems. Whatever the facts of the case, the two compositions remain unsurpassed examples of a certain typical, pawky vein of Scottish humour. “The Jolly Beggar,” besides, contains in burlesque miniature all the essentials of a romantic drama.

Upon the strength of these four compositions a place may be claimed for James V. in the first rank of the writers of humorous pastoral poetry—poetry which finds its inspiration in the actual common life of the people. In this department the king has been rivalled, though hardly surpassed, only by the inspired peasant, Burns himself. Regarding the vitality of his work a trenchant remark has recently been made by one of the foremost critics of the day.[754] “While much of the contemporary and earlier poetry of Scotland,” he says, “is now read only as an historical illustration of the development of literature, that of James V., if he really wrote the gay pieces attributed to him, is read for its native merit.”

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