:a brave prince, demanded instant restitution, and,
at the head of an army, laid siege to the Normans
in the border stronghold.
At this time,the winter snow was covering all the
vast expanse of leafless forest, and the hills-then
growing only heath and gorse-around the Castle of
Edinburgh; and there the queen, with her sons
Edmond, Edgar, and David, and her daughters
Mary and Matilda (surnamed the Good, afterwards
queen of Henry I. of England), were anxiously
waiting tidings from the king and his son Edward,
who?had pressed the siege of Alnwick with such
severity that its garrison was hourly expected to
surrender. A sore sickness was now preying on
the wasted frame of the queen, who spent her days
in prayer for the success of the Scots and the
safety of the king. and prince.
All old historians vie with each other in praise of
the virtuous Margaret. ?? When health and beauty
were hers,? says one writer, ?she devoted her
strength to serve the poor and uncultivated people
whom God had committed to her care; she fed them
with her own hand, smoothed their pillow in sickness,
and softened the barbarous and iron rule of
their feudal lords. No wonder that they regarded
her as a guardian angel among them.?
She daily fed three hundred,? says another
authority, ?waiting upon them on her bended
knees, like a housemaid, washing their feet and
kissing them, For these and other expenses she
not only parted with her own royal dresses, but
more than once she drained the treasury.?
Malcolm, a Celt, is said to have been unable to
read the missals given him by his fair-haired Saxon,
but he was wont to kiss them and press them to
his heart in token of love and respect.
In the castle she built the little oratory on the
very summit of the rock. It stands within the
.citadel, and is in perfect preservation, measuring
about twenty-six feet long by ten, and is spanned
by a finely ornamented a p e arch that springs from
massive capitals, and is covered with zig-zag mouldings.
It was dedicated to her in after years, and
liberally endowed.
?There she is said to have prophetically announced
the surprise of the fortress in 1312, by
causing to be painted on the wall a representation
of a man scaling the Castle rock, with the inscription
underneath, ? Garak-vow Franfais,? a prediction
which was conveniently found to be verified
when the Castle was re-taken from the English by
William Frank (or Francis) and Earl Randolph ;
though why the Saxon saint should prophesy in
French we are left to conjecture.?
Comzcted with the residence of Edgar Atheling?s
sister in Edinburgh Castle there is another
legend, which states that while there she commissioned
her friend St. Catharine-but which
St. Catharine it fails to specify-to bring her some
oil from Mount Sinai; and that after long and
sore travel from the rocks of Mount Horeb, the
saint with the treasured oil came in sight of the
Castle of Edinburgh, on that ridge where stood
the Church of St Mary, built by Macbeth, baron
of Liberton. There she let fall the vessel containing
the sacred oil, which was spilt; but there
sprang up in its place a fountain of wonderful
medicinal efficacy, known now as the Balm Well
of St. Catharine, where the oil-which practical
folk say is bituminous and comes from the coal
seams-may still be seen floating on the limpid
water. It figuted long in monkish legends. For ?
vges a mound near it was alleged to be the tomb of
St Catharine; and close by it James IV. erected a
beautiful little chapel dedicated to St. Margaret,
but long since demolished.
During the king?s absence at Alnwick, the queen,
by the severity of her fastings and vigils, increased
a heavy illness under which she laboured. Two
days before her death, Prince Edgar, whom some
writers call her brother, and others her son, arrived
from the Scottish camp with tidings that Malcolm
had been slain, with her son Edward.
? Then,? according to Lord Hailes, who quotes
Turgot?s Life of SL Margaret, ?? lifting up her eyes
and hands towards heaven, she said, Praise and
blessing be to Thee, Almighty God, that Thou hast
been pleased to make me endure so bitter anguish
in the hour of my departure, thereby, as I trust, to
purify me in some measure from the corruption of
my sins; and Thou, Lord Jesus Christ, who
through the will of the Father, hast enlivened
the world by Thy death, oh, deliver me ! ? While
pronouncing ? deliver me? she expired.?
This, according to the Bishop of St. Andrews,
Turgot, previously Prior of Durham, was after she
had heard mass in the present little oratory, and
been borne to the tower on the west side of the
rock ; and she died holding in her hand a famous
relic known as ?the black rood of Scotland,? which
according to St. Elred, ?was a cross an ell long,
of pure gold and wonderful workmanship, having
thereon an ivory figure of our Saviour marvellously
adorned with gold.?
This was on 16th of November, 1093, when she
was in the forty-seventh year of her age. Unless
history be false, with the majesty of a queen and
the meekness of a saint Margaret possessed a
beauty that falls but seldom to the lot of women ;
and in her time she did much to soften the
