The Earl of March was
unable to place Dunbar in his hands; and, as the Scots declined battle
in the open, he laid siege to Edinburgh, but without success. Dunbar
being closed to him, he was unable to obtain provisions, and was forced
to fall back to England, having accomplished nothing.
During his invasion, he had shown much more leniency than had been the
custom with his predecessors. He had taken what was necessary to
support the army, but had abstained from wasting the country,
destroying villages and towns, and slaughtering the country people;
and, so far from embittering the animosity between the two nations, he
had produced a better state of feeling; and a truce was, in
consequence, concluded for a year, at Kelso, by special commissioners
from both kings, on the 21st of December, 1400.
Chapter 8: Ludlow Castle.
Oswald Forster had not been present when, in June, 1400, the king
arrived at Alnwick. A few days after the coming of the Earl of March,
Hotspur received a letter from Sir Edmund Mortimer, the brother of his
wife; asking him to send a body of men-at-arms, under an experienced
captain who could aid him to drill newly-raised levies; for that one
Owen Glendower had taken up arms against the Lord Grey de Ruthyn, and
that turbulent men were flocking to his standard, and it was feared
that serious trouble might ensue.
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