Page:The Lady of the Lake - Scott (1810).djvu/343

 the laws from the benefit of which they were excluded, and their depredations produced new acts of council, confirming the severity of their proscription, which had only the effect of rendering them still more united and desperate. It is a most extraordinary proof of the ardent and invincible spirit of clanship, that, notwithstanding the repeated proscriptions providently ordained by the legislature, "for the timeous preventing the disorders and oppression that may fall out by the said name and clan of Macgregors, and their followers," they were, 1715 and 1745, in a potent clan, and continue to subsist as a distinct and numerous race.

In 1529, James V. made a convention at Edinburgh, for the purpose of considering the best mode of quelling the Border robbers, who, during the license of his minority, and the troubles which followed, had committed many exorbitancies. Accordingly he assembled a flying army of ten thousand men, consisting of his principal nobility and their followers, who were directed to bring their hawks and dogs with them, that the monarch might refresh himself with sport during the interval of military execution. With this array he swept through Ettrick forest, where he hanged over the gate of his own castle, Piers Cockburn of Henderland, who had prepared, according to tradition, a feast for his reception. He caused Adam Scott