In August 1526 Lennox launched a daring pre-emptive strike of his own. Heading up some 200 horsemen he made to the Boroughmuir outside Edinburgh and there despatched a snatch squad of eight men and eight spare horses into the city. In the dead of night they clattered down the High street making for Holyrood. The King was pre-warned of the plan by the Master of Glencairn and both made for the rendezvous at the palace. However the plot was discovered and the horsemen intercepted. Glencairn fled and the King was moved to the house of the Archbishop of St Andrews where George Douglas and William Douglas, Abbott of Holyrood, with some 40 armed townsmen watched him nightly Lennox returned empty handed from this raid and committed himself and the Queen’s followers to one final military expedition. This was to be the third rescue attempt in the space of the year, and it was to be by far the bloodiest.