Page:History of England (Froude) Vol 4.djvu/128

108 attacked on all sides by enemies, who appeared to have arisen out of the morasses. They wavered, broke, and fled in utter disorder, leaving their commanders to their fate.

English gentlemen, in early ages as well as late, seem to have known how to behave on such occasions. Evers, Layton, Lord Ogle, and a hundred more, 'most of them persons of quality,' were killed; a thousand prisoners—among them the recalcitrant alderman of London—paid for their cowardice by the ransom which was wrung from them. The victory had been won by Angus, in a not unjust revenge. But he remained, or pretended to remain, true to a cause with which he refused to identify the English commander. His friends condescended to apologize for his conduct, as forced upon him; and the Earl himself, if the words which he was said to have used, when threatened with the anger of Henry, were truly ascribed to him, implied that he had rather been provoked by an affront, than become false to his general policy. 'Is our good brother offended,' he exclaimed, 'that I am a good Scotchman; that I revenged on Ralph Evers the abusing of the tombs of my forefathers at Melrose? They were more honourable men than he; and I ought