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In times of civil war, personal rencontres of this kind, and even skirmishes between bands of armed men—usually called tulzies—were of no unfrequent occurrence upon the streets of Edinburgh. They abounded during the troublous time of the minority of James VI. On the 24th of November 1567, the Laird of Airth and the Laird of Wemyss met upon the High Street, and, together with their followers, fought a bloody battle, ‘many,’ as Birrel the chronicler reports, ‘being hurte on both sides by shote of pistoll.’ Three days afterwards there was a strict proclamation, forbidding ‘the wearing of guns or pistolls, or aney sick-like fyerwork ingyne, under ye paine of death, the king’s guards and shouldours only excepted.’ This circumstance seems to be referred to in The Abbot, where the Regent Murray, in allusion to Lord Seyton’s rencontre with the Leslies, in which Roland Græme had borne a distinguished part, says: ‘These broils and feuds would shame the capital of the Great Turk, let alone that of a Christian and reformed state. But if I live, this gear shall be amended; and men shall say,’ &c.