This document Lord Percy holds, to be given to you on a convenient occasion; but he deemed it of so important a nature that it would be too hazardous to send it to you.

The king, in a letter to Lord Percy, begged him to tell you that, so long as the truce continued, he could not collect an army to support you; but that, as the time for its termination approached, he would begin to do so, and would be in readiness to take the field, in the north, immediately you move in the matter." The earl sat for some time, in thought.
"Do you know the conditions of the compact ?" he asked, suddenly.
Oswald had expected this question, and felt sure that the earl, who was, when not inflamed by anger, a cool and cautious man, would highly disapprove of Hotspur's frankness; and might possibly detain him, if he knew that he possessed so important a secret.

He therefore replied: "As to such grave matters, it was not necessary that I should know more than I have said to you, my Lord Earl.

As it is no secret that you and the Douglases have personal enmity, I deemed that the compact referred to our king giving you aid, should you need it against the Douglases." The answer was apparently satisfactory.

The earl asked no further questions, on this head.
"Were there other reasons than those you have stated why he chose you as his messenger ?" "Another reason he gave me, my lord, was that, as I came of a family who reside within a few miles of the border, and had relatives on this side whom I sometimes visited, my language was similar to that spoken in Roxburghshire; so that I could therefore pass as a Lowland Scot, without difficulty.