Page:History of England (Froude) Vol 4.djvu/344

324 The English cruisers had threatened the French supplies. D'Essy was obliged to forage as he could, and the army lying inactive about Edinburgh, became soon on indifferent terms with the people. One morning, at the beginning of October, a Scot was carrying a gun along a street, when a French soldier met him and claimed it. A scuffle began, parties formed, swords were drawn, and shots fired. The provost and the town-guard coming to the spot, took the side of their countrymen; they arrested the soldiers, and were carrying them to the Tolbooth, when a cry rose for a rescue. Their comrades hurried up; the provost and half a dozen gentlemen were presently killed, and the uproar spreading, an English prisoner in Edinburgh who witnessed the scene, said, 'that the French would no sooner espy a Scot, man, woman, or child, come out of doors, or put their heads out of window, but straightway was marked by an harquebus.' The Regent called on d'Essy for explanations, and d'Essy, unable to explain, answered with high words. At last he withdrew the troops beyond the gates, summoned the Rhinegrave to a council, and determined, in order to obliterate the effects of so awkward a business, to go the same evening with the whole army to Haddington, and carry it by a surprise.

The city was no sooner cleared of the soldiers than the gates were shut behind them, 'and the townsmen,