From the remote period; when the Roman province was contracted by the
ramparts of Severus, until the union of the kingdoms, the borders
of Scotland formed the stage, upon which were presented the most
memorable conflicts of two gallant nations. The inhabitants, at the
commencement of this aera, formed the first wave of the torrent which
assaulted, and finally overwhelmed, the barriers of the Roman power
in Britain. The subsequent events, in which they were engaged, tended
little to diminish their military hardihood, or to reconcile them to
a more civilized state of society. We have no occasion to trace the
state of the borders during the long and obscure period of Scottish
history, which preceded the accession of the Stuart family. To
illustrate a few ballads, the earliest of which is hardly coeval with
James V. such an enquiry would be equally difficult and vain. If we
may trust the Welch bards, in their account of the wars betwixt the
Saxons and Danes of Deira and the Cumraig, imagination can hardly
form [Sidenote: 570] any idea of conflicts more desperate, than were
maintained, on the borders, between the ancient British and their
Teutonic invaders. Thus, the Gododin describes the waste and
devastation of mutual havoc, in colours so glowing, as strongly to
recall the words of Tacitus; "_Et ubi solitudinem faciunt, pacem
appellant_[1]."

[Footnote 1: In the spirited translation of this poem, by Jones, the
following verses are highly descriptive of the exhausted state of the
victor army.

At Madoc's tent the clarion sounds,
With rapid clangour hurried far:
Each echoing dell the note resounds--
But when return the sons of war!