985
During a moment of quiet, James II. granted to William, Earl Douglas, on
the 26th of January 1450-1, the forests of Selkirk and Ettrick, in a free
regality, with the accustomed jurisdictions (a). This potent chief now domi-
neered a while in Selkirkshire, but he was too proud and too powerful to
he restrained by gratitude or ruled by law. The Earl of Douglas, in an age
which was fatal to his family, was forfeited in 1455 for his many treasons ;
and on the 4th of August, in the same year, the lordship of Ettrick forest, with
its pertinents, was annexed to the crown by act of Parliament (b). Selkirkshire
was, after this great change, governed by the king's stewart, during three-and-
thirty years, throughout the perturbed reigns of James II. and James III. (c).
But that forfeiture was never forgiven by the Douglases, whose chief pursued
James III., as his evil genius, till he obtained his dethronement and death on
Stirling-field. The first parliament of James IV., which, after that event, met
on the 7th of October 1488, gave the domination of the several sheriffdoms of
Roxburgh, Selkirk, Peebles and Lanark, to the same Earl of Angus who had
thus dethroned the unhappy king (d). The other chiefs of that revolt had all
their individual rewards for their several villainies. Alexander Home, the great
chamberlain, was appointed in parliament, on the 15th of February 1489-90, to
collect the king's rents and casual revenues in the shires of Selkirk and Stirling,
as he had in keeping the castles of Strivelin and Newark (e). The common
people cried out shame and vengeance in vain !
While the chamberlain thus enjoyed the fruits, the king possessed the fee of
those countries. When James IV., who had been made an instrument of mis-
chief by those insurgents, had agreed to marry the Lady Margaret of England,
he thought of those estates for her dower ; and on the 24th of May 1503, he
endowed her with the whole forest of Ettrick in Selkirkshire, with the manor
of Newark and its tower within the same forest (f). She soon after obtained
(a) Scotstarvit's Calendar.                                                 (b) Parl. Rec., 36.
(c)  The parliament, on the 12th of January, 1467-8, having directed an inquest to be made into
each landholder's rent, in each shire, for the purpose of assessment, appointed, in Selkirkshire, for-
making that retour John Murray and John  Turnbull.    Parl. Rec., 151.    This is the first public
appearance of a Murray in Selkirkshire.
(d)  Parl. Rec., 337.
(e) Ib., 364. Newark castle on the Yarrow. About half a mile below it there was the castle of
Oldwark. See Ainslie's Map of Selkirkshire. We are told in song that there is a peel on
Leaderhaughs,
" Which stands as sweet on Leaderside,
As Newark does on Yarrow."
(f) Rym., xiii. 63.