happy? – Feb 24 (Scots win at Roslin)

Subject: happy? – Feb 24 (Scots win at Roslin)
From: Abby Sale
Date: 24 Feb 06 - 08:39 AM


2/24/1303: Scots beat English at Roslin
(south of Edinburgh)

          The English are advancing,
          See how their arms are glancing,
          We'll set them all a-dancing
          At Roslin on the Lee.
  
                  "Roslin on the Lee," Greig~Duncan #111

I fondly add that this was our "local." That is, our own local decrepit castle we'd take visitors to see. I guess everyone in the UK has his/her own, but this was ours. And a lovely off-the-track place it was too. Imagine the castle standing on a mesa in the middle of a once-flooded glen. One of the earliest dwellings with running-water toilets. (Of course, the servants had to haul the water up to the cistern daily but that's a small detail.)

It was another one of those places that stood safe until Cromwell. The story the caretaker told us was that there was an under-the-castle escape tunnel for the laird just in case. When Cromwell's artillery finally reduced the place, the laird & family made use of the tunnel for the first time. Cromwell's spies, however, had told him about this and Cromwell simply had the exit end sealed. When he gained entry to the castle, he had the castle end of it sealed with the family still inside the tunnel. Then Cromwell went home. (Or on to Edinburgh Castle - I forget which direction he was going next.)

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