The Minstrelsy of the Scottish Border

  Randolph, Earl Murray, was my sire,
  Dunbar, Earl March, is thine, &c.—­P. 185, v. 5.

Both these mighty chiefs were connected with Ettrick Forest, and its vicinity.  Their memory, therefore, lived in the traditions of the country.  Randolph, earl of Murray, the renowned nephew of Robert Bruce, had a castle at Ha’ Guards, in Annandale, and another in Peebles-shire, on the borders of the forest, the site of which is still called Randall’s Walls.  Patrick of Dunbar, earl of March, is said by Henry the Minstrel, to have retreated to Ettrick Forest, after being defeated by Wallace.

  And all our wants are well supplied,
    From every rich man’s store;
  Who thankless sins the gifts he gets, &c.—­P. 187. v. 3.

To sin our gifts, or mercies, means, ungratefully to hold them in slight esteem.  The idea, that the possessions of the wicked are most obnoxious to the depredations of evil spirits, may be illustrated by the following tale of a Buttery Spirit, extracted from Thomas Heywood:—­

An ancient and virtuous monk came to visit his nephew, an inn-keeper, and, after other discourse, enquired into his circumstances.  Mine host confessed, that, although he practised all the unconscionable tricks of his trade, he was still miserably poor.  The monk shook his head, and asked to see his buttery, or larder.  As they looked into it, he rendered visible to the astonished host an immense goblin, whose paunch, and whole appearance, bespoke his being gorged with food, and who, nevertheless, was gormandizing at the innkeeper’s expence, emptying whole shelves of food, and washing it down with entire hogsheads of liquor.  “To the depredation of this visitor will thy viands be exposed,” quoth the uncle, “until thou shalt abandon fraud, and false reckonings.”  The monk returned in a year.  The host having turned over a new leaf, and given christian measure to his customers, was now a thriving man.  When they again inspected the larder, they saw the same spirit, but woefully reduced in size, and in vain attempting to reach at the full plates and bottles, which stood around him; starving, in short, like Tantalus, in the midst of plenty.  Honest Heywood sums up the tale thus: 

In this discourse, far be it we should mean
Spirits by meat are fatted made, or lean;
Yet certain ’tis, by God’s permission, they
May, over goods extorted, bear like sway.

* * * * *

All such as study fraud, and practise evil,
Do only starve themselves to plumpe the devill.
Hierarchie of the Blessed Angels, p. 577.