were attaining their lowest level. {67} By 1476 the Lord of the Isles,
the Celtic ally of Edward IV., was reduced by Argyll, Huntly, and
Crawford, and lost the sheriffdom of Inverness, and the earldom of Ross,
which was attached to the Crown (1476). His treaty of Ardtornish had
come to light. But his bastard, Angus Og, filled the north and west with
fire and tumult from Ross to Tobermory (1480-1490), while James's
devotion to the arts--a thing intolerable--and to the society of low-born
favourites, especially Thomas Cockburn, "a stone-cutter," prepared the
sorrows and the end of his reign.

The intrigues which follow, and the truth about the character of James,
are exceedingly obscure. We have no Scottish chronicle written at the
time; the later histories, by Ferrerius, an Italian, and, much later, by
Queen Mary's Bishop Lesley, and by George Buchanan, are full of rumours
and contradictions, while the State Papers and Treaties of England merely
prove the extreme treachery of James's brother Albany, and no evidence
tells us how James contrived to get the better of the traitor. James's
brothers Albany and Mar were popular; were good horsemen, men of their
hands, and Cochrane is accused of persuading James to arrest Mar on a
charge of treason and black magic. Many witches are said to have been
burned: perhaps the only such case before the Reformation. However it
fell out--all is obscure--Mar died in prison; while Albany, also a
prisoner on charges of treasonable intrigues with the inveterate Earl of
Douglas, in the English interest, escaped to France.

Douglas (1482) brought him to England, where he swore allegiance to
Edward IV., under whom, like Edward Balliol, he would hold Scotland if
crowned. He was advancing on the Border with Edward's support and with
the Duke of Gloucester (Richard III.), and James had gone to Lauder to
encounter him, when the Earl of Angus headed a conspiracy of nobles, such