-The
unploughed field--Victory achieved 280-298

XVI.

THE HARVEST OF PEACE.

Great changes effected in habits and character of the
people--Easily explained--"Broken men" expatriated--How
reiving was regarded--Border ethics--Right to rob the
English--Statistics of crime--The Tweed Act--A hard
school--Grim and dour--Services rendered by Borderers--
Great feature of Border life--Birthplace of poetry--The
old ballads--A priceless inheritance--James Thomson, the
author of "The Seasons"--Sir Walter Scott--Hogg--Leyden--
Burns probably sprung from a Border stock--The name
"Burness"--A Western Mecca--Rural population decreasing--
Conclusion 299-310

PREFACE.

The object we have had in view in the following pages has been (1) to
indicate briefly the causes which produced Border reiving; (2) to show the
extent to which the system was ultimately developed; (3) to describe the
means adopted by both Governments for its suppression; (4) to illustrate
the way in which the _rugging and riving_--to use a well-known phrase--was
carried on; (5) to explain how these abnormal conditions were in the end
effectually removed; and (6) to set forth in brief outline some of the
more prominent traits in the lives and characters of the men who were most
closely identified with this extraordinary phase of Border life.

We have to acknowledge our indebtedness for much of the information
conveyed in the following pages to Scott's "Border Antiquities" and
"Border Minstrelsy," Nicolson's "Leges Marchiarum," Pitcairn's "Criminal
Trials," "Calendar of Border Papers" (recently published), "Cary's
Memoirs"--Froissart, Godscroft, Pitscottie, Pinkerton--and host of other
writers on Border themes.

It is in no spirit of mock-modesty we acknowledge how inadequately the
object we have had in view has been realised. The subject is so large and
many-sided that we have found it difficult to compress within the compass
of a single volume anything like an adequate outline of a theme which is
at once so varied and interesting.

In coming to the consideration of this subject, there is one fact which it
is well the reader should carefully bear in mind, and that is, that from
the peculiar circumstances in which Borderers were placed in early times,
the only alternative they had was either to _starve or steal_. The
recognition of this fact will at least awaken our sympathy,