llections--Blair-Drummond, the seat of the Homes of Kaimes; Kier,
that of the principal family of the name of Stirling; Ochtertyre, that
of John Ramsay, the well-known antiquary, and correspondent of Burns;
and Craigforth, that of the Callenders of Craigforth, almost under the
walls of Stirling Castle;--all hospitable roofs, under which he had
spent many of his younger days."

494. Sees the hoofs strike fire. The MS. has "Saw their hoofs of fire."

496. They mark, etc. The to of the infinitive is omitted in glance, as
if mark had been see.

498. Sweltering. The 1st ed. has "swelling."

506. Flinty. The MS. has "steepy;" and in 514 "gains" for scales.

525. Saint Serle. "The King himself is in such distress for a rhyme as
to be obliged to apply to one of the obscurest saints in the calendar"
(Jeffrey). The MS. has "by my word," and "Lord" for Earl in the next
line.

534. Cambus-kenneth's abbey gray. See on iv. 231 above.

547. By. Gone by, past.

551. O sad and fatal mound! "An eminence on the northeast of the Castle,
where state criminals were executed. Stirling was often polluted with
noble blood. It is thus apostrophized by J. Johnston:

'Discordia tristis
Heu quotis procerum sanguine tinxit humum!
Hoc uno infelix, et felix cetera; nusquam
Laetior aut caeli frons geniusve soli.'

"The fate of William, eighth Earl of Douglas, whom James II. stabbed
in Stirling Castle with his own hand, and while under his royal
safe-conduct, is familiar to all who read Scottish history. Murdack Duke
of Albany, Duncan Earl of Lennox, his father-in-law, and his two sons,
Walter and Alexander Stuart, were executed at Stirling, in 1425. They
were beheaded upon an eminence without the Castle walls, but making part
of the same hill, from whence they could behold their strong Castle of
Doune and their extensive possessions. This 'heading hill,' as it was
sometimes termed, bears commonly the less terrible name of Hurly-hacket,
from its having been the scene of a courtly amusement alluded to by
Sir David Lindsay, who says of the pastimes in which the young King was
engaged:

'Some harled him to the Hurly-hacket;'

which consisted in sliding--in some sort of chair, it may be
supposed--from top to bottom of a smooth bank. The boys of Edinburgh,
about twenty years ago, used to play at the hurly-hacket on the Calton
Hill, using for their seat a horse's skull" (Scott).

558. The Franciscan