Monasteries and cathedrals were certain to perish sooner or later, for the lead of every such roof except Coldingham had been stripped and sold by 1585, while tombs had been desecrated for their poor spoils, and the fanes were afterwards used as quarries of hewn stone.

Lord James had a peculiar aversion to idolatrous books, and is known to have ordered the burning of many manuscripts;--the loss to art was probably greater than the injury to history or literature.

The fragments of things beautiful that the Reformers overlooked, were destroyed by the Covenanters.

An attempt has been made to prove that the Border abbeys were not wrecked by Reformers, but by English troops in the reign of Henry VIII., who certainly ravaged them.
Lesley, however, says that the abbeys of Kelso and Melrose were "by them (the Reformers) broken down and wasted." {125a} If there was nothing left to destroy on the Border, why did the brethren march against Kelso, as Cecil reports, on July 9, 1559?
{125b} After the devastation the Regent meant to attack the destroyers, intending to occupy Cupar, six miles, by Knox's reckoning, from St.
Andrews.

But, by June 13, the brethren had anticipated her with a large force, rapidly recruited, including three thousand men under the Lothian professors; Ruthven's horse; the levies of the Earl of Rothes (Leslie), and many burgesses.