The views from the battlements are still stunning, but were originally more an aid to protection than for admiration. In the north wall-walk is a watchman's seat, cleverly fashioned to take advantage of the heat from the chimney flue. The first two floors were used for storage and the stone vault over the upper storage floor both helped the stability of the tower and guarded against the spread of fire. On the floor above this was the Hall, the main living area for the laird and his family. This would have been the grandest room, denoted by the heavy but elegant fireplace and window seats.
Crude carvings remain at the base of the fireplace, of a bearded man and a heart.
The obligations and duties of the laird included hospitality to both his inferiors and superiors and excavations have revealed that there was a fifteenth century Hall in the west courtyard. At the Battle of Flodden in 1513, the then laird, David Pringle, lost his three brothers and his eldest son and the dangerous and unsettled times continued after his death. There are records of very large numbers of cattle, horses and prisoners taken during these raids throughout the sixteenth century. In the later sixteenth century, the Pringles acquired a chapel in the south aisle of Melrose Abbey for their family burials. The Smailholm estate was sold in 1645, due to insolvency after Sir James Pringle's death in 1635 and was bought by Sir William Scott of Harden, already related to the Pringles through marriage.