has attempted to exhibit, in outline, the leading features of the
international history of the two countries which, in 1707, became the
United Kingdom. Relations with England form a large part, and the heroic
part, of Scottish history, relations with Scotland a very much smaller
part of English history. The result has been that in histories of
England references to Anglo-Scottish relations are occasional and
spasmodic, while students of Scottish history have occasionally
forgotten that, in regard to her southern neighbour, the attitude of
Scotland was not always on the heroic scale. Scotland appears on the
horizon of English history only during well-defined epochs, leaving no
trace of its existence in the intervals between these. It may be that
the space given to Scotland in the ordinary histories of England is
proportional to the importance of Scottish affairs, on the whole; but
the importance assigned to Anglo-Scottish relations in the fourteenth
century is quite disproportionate to the treatment of the same subject
in the fifteenth century. Readers even of Mr. Green's famous book, may
learn with surprise from Mr. Lang or Mr. Hume Brown the part played by
the Scots in the loss of the English dominions in France, or may fail to
understand the references to Scotland in the diplomatic correspondence
of the sixteenth century.[1] There seems to be, therefore, room for a
connected narrative of the attitude of the two countries towards each
other, for only thus is it possible to provide the _data_ requisite for
a fair appreciation of the policy of Edward I and Henry VIII, or of
Elizabeth and James I. Such a narrative is here presented, in outline,
and the writer has tried, as far as might be, to eliminate from his work
the element of national prejudice.

The book has also another aim. The relations between England and
Scotland have not been a purely political connexion. The peoples have,
from an early date, been, to some extent, intermingled, and this mixture