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Rh secretary Johnston, were sent back to Edinburgh to see what could be done in the way of procuring- gratuitous supplies. As it would have been displeasing to the English, had the army been under the necessity of cutting down trees, for erecting huts, as had been the practice in former times, when inroads were made upon their border, the commissioners were instructed to use their influence with their countrymen, to provide as much cloth as would serve for tents during their encampments in that country. It was late on a Saturday night when the commissioners arrived in Edinburgh, but the exhortations of the ministers next day were so effectual, that on Monday the women of Edinburgh alone produced webs of coarse linen, vulgarly called harn, nearly sufficient for tents to the whole army; and the married men, with equal promptitude, advanced the sum of one hundred and twenty thousand pounds, with a promise of remitting as much more in a few days, which they did accordingly. Having obtained these supplies, and a considerable train of black cattle and sheep to be used as provisions, the Scottish army moved from Chouseley wood towards Coldstream, where they intended to enter England by a well-known ford over the Tweed. The river being swollen, they were obliged to camp on a spacious plain called Hirsel Haugh, till the flood should subside ; and here they first proved the cloth furnished them for tents, by the good women of Edinburgh. On the 20th, the river having sunk to its ordinary level, it was resolved that the army should march forward. This, however, was considered so momentous an affair, that not one of the leading men would volunteer to be the first to set hostile feet upon the English border; and it was left to the lot to decide who should have the honour, or the demerit of doing so. The lot fell upon Montrose, who, aware of his own defection, and afraid of those suspicions with which he already saw himself regarded, eagerly laid hold of this opportunity to lay them asleep. Plunging at once into the stream, he waded through to the other side without a single attendant, but immediately returned to encourage his men ; and a line of horse being planted on the upper side of the ford to break the force of the stream, the foot passed easily and safely, only one man being drowned of the whole army. The commanders, like Montrose, with the exception of those who commanded the horse employed to break the force of the water, waded at the head of their respective regiments, and though it was four o'clock, P. M., before they began to pass, the whole were on the English side before midnight. They encamped for that night on a hill that had been occupied by a troop of English horse, set to guard the ford, but which had fled before the superior force of the Scottish army; large fires were kindled in advance, which, says one of the actors in the scene, "rose like so many heralds proclaiming our crossing of the river, or rather like so many prodigious comets foretelling the fall of this ensuing storm upon our enemies in England;" contrary to the intentions of the Scots, "these fires so terrified the country people, that they all fled with bag and baggage towards the south parts of the country," according to the above author, "leaving their desolate houses to the mercy of the army." Charles left London to take command of his army, which had already rendezvoused at York, on the same day the Scottish army crossed the Tweed. This army, as we have stated above, was said to be twenty-one thousand strong; but from the aversion of the people in general to the service, there is reason to suppose, that in reality it fell far short of that number. The earl of Northumberland was nominated to the command, but he felt, says an English historian, disgusted at being called forth to act the most conspicuous part in a business which no good man in the kingdom relished; and taking advantage of a slight indisposition, he declared himself unfit to perform the duties of his function. Stafford, of course, exercised the supreme command,