THE ROYAL CITY OF STIRLING
As a good deal of the scene of the poem is laid at Stirling, and as
most people will take the opportunity of breaking their journey at so
classic a town, a few pages must be devoted to it.
[Illustration: STIRLING CASTLE, FROM THE KING’S KNOT.
In 1304 the Castle was taken by the English after a three month’s
siege, and held by them until the Battle of Bannockburn in 1314.]
[Sidenote: The “Round Table”]
The rock on which the castle of Stirling stands is a most remarkable
object in the landscape, jutting out with the precipitousness of a
sea-cliff from the plain. It is absolutely inaccessible on the one
side, but slopes away on the other, and it is on these slopes that the
town stands. Many a visitor has grumbled at the long pull up through
the narrow, and in some places squalid, streets before reaching the
castle; but the reward is great, for the view is far-reaching. It
may be best seen, however, from a place called the Ladies’ Rock in
the churchyard, because there it includes the castle-rock on its
steepest side. Here, also, there is to be found a plan of all the
mountains by which they may be identified—Bens Ledi, Lomond, Vane,
More, and Voirlich; also, down below, is a curious turf-garden, called
the King’s Knot, said to have been the scene of the mimic games and
contests of the Court. It was here Scott laid the scene of the games
described in the poem, and with what redoubled interest can the
account be read, when, having seen the place, memory can conjure up
a mind-picture of it! This odd terracing is mentioned by Barbour, in
describing the flight of Edward II. after Bannockburn, as the Round
Table. It is within the bounds of possibility that it existed in the
days of King Arthur, for centuries before Arthur’s time Stirling was
a Roman station, and the King in his day is known to have been in the
neighbourhood.
The history of Stirling reaches back beyond all records. Long before
Edinburgh had attained its position as capital of the kingdom, while
it was still but a Border fortress, liable to be taken and retaken as
English or Scots extended their territory, Stirling was one of the
strongholds of the country. From time immemorial some fortress had
stood on this impregnable position. In 1124 Alexander I. died here, so
that it must then have been a fortress-palace, and in 1304 the castle
held out for three months against Edward I. of England. After it was
taken it remained in the possession of England until the Battle of
Bannockburn, and Bannockburn lies only about three miles from Stirling.
Even the supine Edward II. wended his way so far north with the object
of retaining such a desirable place. James III. was born here, and
probably James IV. also, while James V., the hero of _The Lady of the
Lake_, was crowned in the parish church as a toddling child of two. His
much-discussed daughter, Queen Mary, passed the years of her childhood
at the castle. Her little son James, who was destined to unite the two
kingdoms, was baptized at the castle with tremendous ceremony, while
his father, Darnley, sulked apart, and refused to take his proper
position. Here James VI. and I. spent mainly the first thirteen years
of his life, under the tutelage of the scholar George Buchanan, and it
was only when he became King of England that Stirling ceased to be a
royal residence.
Of the origin of the name Stirling there is no certain record. In
old records it is spelt Stryveling, Strivilin, and so on, through
various minor alterations, wherefore it has sometimes been held to mean
“strife,” a most appropriate signification. It used occasionally to be
referred to also as Snowdon, a fact mentioned in Scott’s poem:
For Stirling’s Tower
Of yore the name of Snowdon claims.
[Sidenote: The Wandering King]
By far the most striking part of the castle is the palace, which was
begun by James IV. and finished by James V. This is in the form of a
square, and is decidedly French in character, a fact attributed to
the influence of his wife, Mary of Guise. Strange life-size figures
project beneath arcades, and the carving is in some cases most weird
and grotesque. James V. was very much associated with the castle. He
was fond of assuming disguises and wandering about incognito among his
people; for this purpose he sometimes took the name of the “Gudeman of
Ballengeich,” Ballengeich being a road running below the castle walls.
The songs “The Gaberlunzie Man” and “We’ll gang nae mair a-rovin” are
said to have been founded on his exploits. He was renowned for his
success with the fair sex, and altogether the rôle given to him by
Scott fits him admirably.
The castle is now occupied by a garrison, and the picturesque Highland
dress of the men adds much as a foreground to the grey walls of the
old buildings. An awkward squad may frequently be seen drilling in the
courtyard, unkindly exposed to the eyes of passing visitors. In this
square is the Parliament House, built by James III., and this is where
the last Parliament in Scotland held its sittings.
[Sidenote: The Douglas Room]
The Douglas Room, reached by a narrow passage, will, however, claim
most attention from those to whom history is a living thing. It was
here that James II. stabbed the Earl of Douglas in 1452. The Douglases
had so grown in power and influence, that it had begun to be a question
whether Stuarts or Douglases should reign in Scotland. The King was
afraid of the power of his mighty rivals, and accordingly invited
the Douglas, the eighth Earl, to come as his guest to the castle for
a conference. The Douglas came without misgiving, though it is said
he demanded, and received, a safe-conduct. It was about the middle
of January, and no doubt huge log fires warmed the inclement air in
the great draughty halls where the party dined and supped with much
appearance of cordiality and goodwill, but beneath lay hate and terror
and rancour, bitter as the grave.
After supper the King drew Douglas aside to an inner chamber, and tried
to persuade him to break away from the allies which threatened, with
his house, to form a combination disastrous to the security of the
throne. The Earl refused, and high words began to fly from one to the
other. The King demanded that Douglas should break from his allies, and
the Earl replied again he would not. “Then this shall!” cried the King,
twice stabbing his guest with his own royal hand. Sir Patrick Grey, who
was near by, came up and finished the job with a pole-axe, and then the
body was thrown over into the court below. It was a gross violation of
every law of decency even in those lawless days, and well the King must
have known the storm his action would arouse. Burton, the historian of
Scotland, adduces this as evidence that the crime was not meditated,
but done in a mere fit of ungovernable rage. The murdered man’s four
brothers surrounded and besieged the castle, and nailing to a cross
in contempt the safe-conduct the King had given, trailed it through
the miry streets tied to the tail of the wretchedest horse they could
find, thus publishing the ignominy of their Sovereign. They burnt and
destroyed wherever they could, and the King had many years of strenuous
warfare before him as a result of that night’s work.
From the castle battlements the “bonny links of Forth” can be seen
winding and looping and doubling on themselves, and also the old
bridge, which was the key to the Highlands and the only dry passage
across the Forth for centuries. This bridge is even older than any
existing part of the castle. It has seen many desperate skirmishes,
most notable of which was that of 1715, when the Duke of Argyll, with
only 1,500 men, held here in check thousands of Highlanders. Here we
must leave Stirling, without noting the rest of the old buildings, as
this is no guide-book, and the city is merely looked upon as the key to
the Trossachs and the scene of some of the drama enacted in _The Lady
of the Lake_.