REIGN OF JAMES VI.: 1603-1625.

The death of Elizabeth, March 24, 1603, opened the way for King James to the English throne. He left Scotland on the 5th of April, after taking a tender farewell of his Scottish subjects, and promising to revisit them once every three years. He did not allow one year to elapse without making an effort to accomplish a union between England and Scotland; but it ended in the comparatively narrow result of establishing that the postnati—that is, Scotsmen born after the king’s accession to the English crown—should be regarded as naturalised in both countries.

James, thoroughly believing that no puritan could be a loyal subject, continued to be anxious for the reduction of the Scottish Church under the royal supremacy and a hierarchy. The personal influence he acquired as king of England enabled him in some degree to accomplish this object, though all but wholly against the inclinations of the clergy and people.

The more zealous Presbyterian clergy had made up their minds, in a General Assembly now to be held at Aberdeen, to ‘call in question all the conclusions taken in former assemblies for the episcopal government.’308 The king, hearing of their design, caused his commissioner, Sir Alexander Straiton of Laurieston, to forbid the meeting. About twenty bold spirits, nevertheless, assembled (July 1605); and when Sir Alexander ordered them to dissolve, they did not obey till they had asserted their independence by appointing another day of meeting. When called soon after before the Privy Council, thirteen came in the king’s mercy; but eight stood out for the independence of their church, and were sent to various prisons.

Six of the recusant clergymen were tried at Linlithgow (January 1606) for high treason, and found guilty. After their condemnation, they were remanded to various prisons to await his majesty’s pleasure. (See November 6, 1606.)

At a parliament held in Perth (July 1606), under the king’s favourite minister, George Home, Earl of Dunbar, bishops were introduced, and the king’s prerogative confirmed in ample style. The Scottish statesmen and councillors were full of servility to the king. James caused several of the more zealous Presbyterian clergy, including the venerable but still energetic Andrew Melville, and his nephew James, to be brought to a conference in London, hoping to prevail upon them to cease their opposition; but it ended in the one being banished for an epigram, and the other being confined for life to the town of Berwick. In 1610, the king’s supremacy was acknowledged by the General Assembly, and consecrated bishops were settled in authority over dioceses. A court of High Commission, with immense power over clergy, schools, colleges, and people was also introduced. Regal influence, gold, cajolery, and a judicious deliberation, effected the appearance of an episcopal reformation, while the great bulk of the people endured with a silent protest what they could not resist.

At the same time, the new strength of the crown, as administered under the able chancellor, Seton, Earl of Dunfermline, and Thomas, Earl of Melrose (subsequently of Haddington), caused such an obedience to the laws throughout Scotland as had never before been known. The attempt at a plantation of the island of Lewis, with a view to the civilisation of the Hebrides, was renewed under these favouring circumstances, but altogether without success.

The king’s sole visit to his native kingdom took place in 1617, as to some extent detailed in the chronicle. His chief design was to advance the desired reformation of the national religion, by paving the way for an introduction of some of the English ceremonies. These were—kneeling at the eucharist, private administration of baptism to weak children, private administration of the communion to dying Christians, the confirmation of children, and the observance of Christmas and Easter. Protestant churches of most respectable character make no objection to these rites and forms; but among the Scottish people of that day they were viewed with great dislike. From a subservient General Assembly (1618), the Five Articles of Perth, as they were called, received a reluctant assent, and three years after they were confirmed by parliament.

While these struggles were going on between Presbyterianism and Episcopacy, the adherents of both systems cordially concurred in the persecution of the Catholics. Nobles and gentlemen of that persuasion were unblushingly called upon either to embrace Protestantism or submit to forfeiture of property and country. Priests were severely punished; one hanged. Shewing severity to the Papists was one of the principal means used by the king to conciliate the Presbyterians to his prelatic innovations.

Beyond inducing a few ministers to accept the mitre, and obtaining a hollow conformity from persons in authority, James made no progress in converting the Scotch to episcopacy, excepting in Aberdeenshire and some other northern provinces. The people refused to kneel at the communion, or have baptism and the eucharist administered in private. The holidays were disregarded. Withdrawing from the churches, the people began to meet in conventicles or in private houses for worship after their own manner. The established church sank into the character of ‘an institution.’

The English reign of James VI. was, nevertheless, in secular respects, a comparatively serene and happy time in Scotland. Peace blessed the land. For the first time, the law was everywhere enforced with tolerable vigour; some practical improvements were introduced. Even the Highlands began during this period to shew some approach to order.

James died March 27, 1625, in his fifty-ninth year, after a nominal reign over Scotland of little less than fifty-eight years.

1603.

Mar. 26.

Apr. 3.

Intelligence of the death of Elizabeth—the event took place at an early hour on the morning of Thursday the 24th March—was brought to King James by Robert Carey, a young aspirant of the English court, who, making a rapid journey on horseback, reached Holyroodhouse on Saturday evening after the king had retired to rest. This was probably the most rapid transit from London to Edinburgh previous to the days of railways. The son of the governor of Berwick came next day and delivered the keys of that town to the Scottish monarch. On the ensuing Sunday, James appeared in his ordinary seat in St Giles’s Kirk, attended by a number of the English nobility; and after service, made an orison or harangue to the people, promising to defend the faith, and to ‘visit his people and guid subjects in Scotland every three years.’ On the 5th of April, ‘his majesty took journey to Berwick; at whilk time there was great lamentation and mourning amang the commons for the loss of the daily sight of their blessit prince. At this time, all the haill commons of Scotland that had rede or understanding were daily speaking and exponing of Thomas the Rhymer his prophecy, and of other prophecies whilk were prophecied in auld times; as namely it was prophecied in Henry the 8 days—Hempe is begun, God give it long to last; Frae Hempe begun, England may tak rest. To make it that it may be understood, H for Henry, E for England, M for Mary, P for Philip, king of Spain, that marryit with Queen Mary, and E for worthy good Queen Elizabeth: sae it is come that England may tak rest; for there is no more England, but Great Britain. Siclike it was spoken in Scots—Ane French wife shall bear a son shall brook all Britain by the sea. For it is true that King James 6 his mother was ane French wife, in respect she was marryit to the Prince of France, wha was so stylit.... It was likewise writ in another prophecy:

Now-a-days, it would be ‘all the people that had not rede or understanding’ that would be speaking of prophecies in relation to public events. At that time, however, as has been stated before, metrical and other prophecies, commonly attributed to Thomas the Rhymer, a sage who lived at the end of the thirteenth century, were in great vogue. In this year, Robert Waldegrave printed a brochure containing a collection of these metrical predictions, ascribed to Merlin, Bede, Waldhave, Thomas Rymour, and others. In this volume may be found the prediction of Hempe, but in a different form, and the two others quoted by Birrel. The reader may turn back to January 1, 1561-2, for an account of Waldegrave’s book of prophecies, and some remarks on that special prediction regarding the son of the French wife, which was now called so particularly into notice.

May 28.

‘The queen and prince came from Stirling [to Edinburgh]. There were sundry English ladies and gentlewomen come to give her the convoy.’ On the 30th, ‘her majesty and the prince came to St Giles Kirk, weel convoyit with coaches, herself and the prince in her awn coach, whilk came with her out of Denmark, and the English gentlewomen in the rest of the coaches. They heard ane guid sermon in the kirk, and thereafter rade hame to Halyroodhouse.’—Bir.

June.

The pestilence, which had for some time been raging in England, is noted as now affecting the south of Scotland, and continuing till the ensuing February.—Chron. Perth.

July 21.

1603.

James Reid, a noted sorcerer and charmer, was strangled and burnt on the Castle Hill of Edinburgh for his alleged practice of healing by the black art. ‘Whilk craft,’ says his dittay, ‘he learnt frae the devil, his master, in Binnie Craigs and Corstorphin Craigs, where he met with him and consulted with him to learn the said craft; wha gave him three pennies at ane time, and a piece creish309 out of his bag at ane other time; he having appeared to the said James diverse times, whiles in the likeness of a man, whiles in the likeness of a horse ... whilk likewise learned him to tak south-rinning water to cure the said diseases.’ It was alleged that James had cured Sarah Borthwick of a grievous ailment by ‘casting a certain quantity of wheat and salt about her bed.’ He had tried to destroy the crops of David Libberton, a baker, by directing an enchanted piece of raw flesh to be put under his mill-door, and casting nine stones upon his lands. Nay, he had done what he could to destroy David himself, by making a picture of him in wax, and turning it before a fire. The authorities made short work of so grievous an offender by sending him direct from judgment to execution.’—Pit.

Oct. 2.

Campbell of Ardkinlas, set on by the Earl of Argyle, exerted himself to capture Macgregor of Glenstrae, who for some months had been under ban of the government on account of the slaughterous conflict of Glenfruin. He called Macgregor to a banquet in his house, which stands within a loch, and there made no scruple to lay hold of the unfortunate chieftain. Being immediately after put into a boat, under a guard of five men, to be conducted to the Earl of Argyle, Macgregor contrived to get his hands loose, struck down the guardsman nearest him, and leaping into the water, swam to land unharmed.

Some time after, the Earl of Argyle sent a message to Macgregor, desiring him to come and confer with him, under promise to let him go free if they should not come to an agreement. ‘Upon the whilk, the Laird Macgregor came to him, and at his coming was weel received by the earl, wha shew him that he was commanded by the king to bring him in, but he had no doubt but his majesty wald, at his request, pardon his offence, and he should with all diligence send twa gentlemen to England with him.... Upon the whilk fair promises, he was content, and came with the Earl of Argyle to Edinburgh’ (January 9, 1604), ‘with eighteen mae of his friends.’310

1603.

The sad remainder of the transaction is narrated by the diarist Birrel, with a slight difference of statement as to the agreement on which the surrender had taken place. Macgregor ‘was convoyit to Berwick by the guard, conform to the earl’s promise; for he promised to put him out of Scots grund. Sae he keepit ane Hieland-man’s promise, in respect he sent the guard to convoy him out of Scots grund; but they were not directed to part with him, but to fetch him back again. The 18 of January, he came at even again to Edinburgh, and upon the 20 day, he was hangit at the Cross, and eleven mae of his friends and name, upon ane gallows; himself being chief, he was hangit his awn height above the rest of his friends.’

A confession of Macgregor has been printed by Mr Pitcairn. It might rather be called a justification, the whole blame being thrown upon Argyle, whose crafty policy it fully exposes. It is alleged that, after instigating Ardkinlas to take Macgregor, the earl endeavoured to induce Macgregor to undertake the murder of Ardkinlas, besides that of the Laird of Ardencaple. ‘I never granted thereto, through the whilk he did envy me greatumly’ [that is, bore me a great grudge]. His whole object, Macgregor says, was ‘to put down innocent men, to cause poor bairns and infants beg, and poor women to perish for hunger, when they are herried of their geir.’

Even in that barbarous age, when executions were lamentably frequent, the spectacle of twelve men hanging on one gallows, one of them a chieftain of ancient lineage, must have been an impressive one. ‘A young man, called James Hope, beholding the execution, fell down, and power was taken from half of his body. When he was carried to a house, he cried that one of the Highland men had shot him with an arrow. He died upon the Sabbath-day after.’—Cal.

The subsequent persecution of the Macgregors, persevered in by the government during many years, belongs to history. Its severity ‘obliged multitudes of them to abandon their habitations; and they retired to such places as they thought would afford them security and protection. The better sort made the best bargains they could with their enemies, and gave up their estates and possessions for small compositions. By these transmigrations, they came, in the end, to be scattered through all parts of the kingdom, where their posterity are still to be found under different names, and even many of them have lost the very memory of their original.... They are still pretty numerous in the Highlands ... many are found in other parts of the kingdom, who are possessed of opulent fortunes; and some of that race have since made a considerable figure, both in civil and military government, though covered under borrowed names.’—Memoir of Sir Ewen Cameron, by Drummond of Balhadies, about 1737.

Nov. 20.

1603.

It was found at Aberdeen, that, great numbers of people resorting thither at Whitsunday and Martinmas ‘for their leesome affairs, some to receive in their debts, others to uplift and give out siller on profit,’ quarrels were extremely apt to fall out amongst them, on account of old ‘feids standing unreconcilit.’ Hence, it sometimes happened that this commercial city became a scene of wide-spread tumult, the strangers dividing into hostile parties and fighting with each other, in defiance of all that the magistrates could do to make them desist. Nay, ‘the magistrates and neighbours of this burgh, standing betwixt the said parties, for redding and staunching the said tumults, has been divers and sundry times in great danger and peril, and some of them hurt and woundit, not being of power to resist the said parties.’

For these reasons, the town-council, at this date, passed a strict act for the preservation of the peace, but probably with very little immediate effect.

1604. Apr.

‘Ane servant woman of Mr John Hall, minister, died in his awn house, alleged to be the pest, as God forbid: yet he and his house was clengit.’—Bir. The fear of pestilence, here so strikingly expressed, was too well founded. The disease spread in May, and increased in the heat of July. The people fled from the town, and we find that one William Kerr, a blacksmith, thought it a good opportunity for helping himself to property not his own, and was hanged in December for having opened the doors of several of the empty houses.—Bir.

June 15.

‘The men of Black Ruthven and Huntingtower cuist turfs on our burgh moor at command of the comptroller, Sir David Murray, captain of his majesty’s guard, and our provost for the time. The town rase aught hundred men in arms, and put them off. Angus Cairdney died of the apoplexy there. No ma harm, but great appearance of skaith.’—Chron. Perth.

It is remarkable to find that Perth could then send out 800 armed men. This, however, was not the utmost strength of the Fair City; for in the ensuing month, when a parliament was held there, ‘the town mustered fourteen hundred men in arms and guid equipage.’—Chron. Perth.

1604.

Patrick, Earl of Orkney, paid a visit to the Earl of Sutherland at Dornoch, where he spent some time, ‘honourably enterteened with comedies, and all other sports and recreations that Earl John could make him.’—G. H. S.

James Melville notes in his Diary the appearance of a brilliant star which shone out this year ‘aboon Edinburgh, hard by the sun,’ in the middle of the day; ‘prognosticating, undoubtedly, strange alterations and changes in the world; namely, under our climate.’

This notice most probably refers to a star, of the same kind with that mentioned in 1572, and nearly as brilliant, which is described as having appeared in the east foot of Serpentarius, in October of this year.

Sep. 10.

‘The general master of the cunyie-house took shipping to London, for the defence of the Scotch cunyie before the Council of England. Wha defendit the same to the uttermost; and the wit and knawledge of the general was wondered at by the Englishmen. The said general and master came hame the 10 of December.’—Bir.

That the general master of the cunyie-house should have shewed so much wit and knowledge on this occasion, will not excite much surprise in the reader, when it is made known that he was Napier of Merchiston, father of the great philosopher.—Bal.

Dec. 7.

‘Ane hour before the sun rose, the moon shining clear two days before the change, in a calm and pleasant morning, there was at ane instant seen great inflammations of fire-flaughts in the eastern hemisphere, and suddenly thereafter there was heard ane crack, as of a great cannon, and sensibly marked a great globe or bullet, fiery coloured, with a mighty whistling noise, flying from the north-east to the south-west, whilk left behind it a blue train and draught in the air, most like ane serpent in mony faulds and linkit wimples; the head whereof breathing out flames and smoke, as it wald directly invade the moon, and swallow her up; but immediately the sun, rising fair and pleasant, abolished all. The crack was heard of all, within as without the house; and sic as were without at the time, or hastily ran out to see, did very sensibly see and mark the rest above rehearsed. Here was a subject for poets and prophets to play upon....’—Ja. Mel.

1605. Jan. 19.

‘James Young, player at cards and dice, was slain in the kirk [St Giles] by ane boy of sixteen years of age, called Lawrence Man. This Lawrence was beheaded on the Castle Hill, the last day of Januar.’—Bir.

May 2.

1605.

A curious case was considered by the Privy Council. James Blackadder of Tulliallan had been charged by Sir Michael Balfour of Burleigh, to address himself to Perth, and there buy from him and his factor John Jamieson three stands of horsemen’s arms, under pain of rebellion if he failed to do so before a particular day. James represented to the lords that long before Sir Michael had brought home these arms, he had provided himself otherwise with ‘twa good corslets of proof for his awn person, besides a number of jacks for his servants, with certain muskets, hagbuts, pikes, spears, and all other sort of arms sufficient for aucht persons,’ although not bound by his rent to provide arms for more than two. He wholly resisted the demand of Sir Michael, inferring an outlay of sixty pounds, on the ground that his estate did not extend beyond twenty-four chalders of victual, out of which he had diverse sums of interest to pay—inferring that he was not liable to have more than one stand of horsemen’s arms. The lords decreed that James was in the right, and that Sir Michael’s proceedings against him should cease.—P. C. R.

June 17.

‘Ane combat or tulyie [was] foughten at the Salt Tron of Edinburgh, betwixt the Laird of Ogle [Edzell], younger, and his complices, and the young Laird of Pitarrow, Wishart. The faught lasted frae 9 hours till 11 at night, twa hours. There were sundry hurt on both sides, and ane Guthrie slain, which was Pitarrow’s man, ane very pretty young man. The 18th, they were accusit before the Council, and wardit.’—Bir.

The Lairds of Edzell and Pitarrow were committed to ward, for not having confined their sons, as the chancellor had commanded. Edzell, foreseeing troubles to himself and his son from the death of Guthrie, sent a surgeon to examine the corpse, with a view to establishing that the young man had not died of the wounds he received in the tulyie, but had been ‘smoored in the throng.’

Edzell was in his way a remarkable man. Possessing a degree of taste uncommon in that age, he had built for himself at Edzell on the Esk in Forfarshire, a mansion of singular elegance, possessing in particular a screen-wall, ornamented with allegorical figures, the remains of which even at this day excite the surprise of the passing traveller. His latter days were clouded by the consequences of the violent passions of his eldest son, one of the principals in the above combat. We shall presently hear more of both him and his son.

1605.

A man called Alister Mac William Mor, a servant of Hugh Mackay of Far, happening to go into Caithness on some business, was there entrapped by emissaries of the Earl of Caithness, who bore him a grudge for his conduct in a former feud. The earl caused Alister to be beheaded before his eyes next day. The subsequent proceedings are curious. Mackay prosecuted Lord Caithness before the Justiciary Court at Edinburgh; but the Marquis of Huntly brought them together at Elgin; and ‘the Earl of Caithness acknowledged his offence before the friends there present; whereupon they were finally agreed, and all past injuries were again forgiven by either party.’ Not a word of the general claim of justice on behalf of the public!—G. H. S.

July.

At the end of this month, the pest broke out in Edinburgh, Leith, St Andrews, and other parts of the kingdom. Among the first houses infected in Edinburgh was that of the Chancellor Dunfermline. James Melville, looking to the recent proceedings of this statesman against the more zealous ministers, considered him as overtaken by ‘the penalty pronounced by Joshua upon the building up of Jericho.... His eldest and only son died, and a young damosel his niece, so that he was compelled to dissolve his family, and go with his wife alone, as in hermitage, with great fear of the death of his daughter also, on whom the boils brake forth. This was marked and talked of by the people.’

The Fife adventurers who had been obliged to leave the Lewis in 1601 on a promise never to return, made a new attempt at this time to complete their unhappy undertaking. Attended with considerable forces, led partly by one William Mac Williams, chieftain of the Clan Gunn, they landed in the island, and ‘sent a message unto Tormod Macleod, shewing that if he would yield unto them, in name and behalf of the king [now a more formidable name than it had been], they should transport him safely to London, where his majesty then was; and being arrived there, they would not only obtein his pardon, but also suffer him, without let or hindrance, to deal by his friends for his majesty’s favour, and for some means whereby he might live. Whereunto Tormod Macleod condescended, and would not adventure the hazard of his fortune against so great forces as he perceived ready there to assail him. This did Tormod Macleod against the opinion and advice of his brother, Niel Macleod, who stood out and would not yield.

1605.

‘So the adventurers sent Tormod Macleod to London, where he caused his majesty to be rightly informed of the case; how the Lewis was his just inheritance; how his majesty was sinistrously informed by the undertakers, who had abused his majesty in making him believe that the same was at his disposition, whereupon proceeded much unnecessary trouble and great bloodshed; and thereupon he humbly entreated his majesty to do him justice, and to restore him to his own. The adventurers, understanding that his majesty began to hearken to the complaint of Tormod Macleod, used all their credit at court to cross him. In end, they prevailed so far—some of them being the king’s domestic servants—that they procured him to be taken and sent home prisoner into Scotland, where he remained captive at Edinburgh, until the month of March 1615 years, that the king gave him liberty to pass into Holland, to Maurice, Prince of Orange, where Tormod ended his days.’—G. H. S.

Tormod being thus put out of the way, ‘the enterprise of the Lewis was again set on foot by Robert Lumsden of Airdrie and Sir George Hay of Netherliffe, to whom some of the first undertakers had made over their right. In August they took journey thither, and by the assistance of Mackay Mackenzie and Donald Gorm, forced the inhabitants to remove forth of the isle, and give surety not to return.

‘Airdrie and his co-partners, thinking all made sure, returned south about Martinmas, leaving some companies to maintain their possession, which they made good all that winter, though now and then they were assaulted by the islesmen. In the spring, Airdrie went back, taking with him fresh provision, and fell to building and manuring the lands. But this continued not long; for, money failing, the workmen went away, and the companies diminishing daily, the islesmen made a new invasion about the end of harvest, and by continual incursions so outwearied the new possessors, as they gave over their enterprise, and were contented for a little sum of money to make away their rights to the Laird of Mackenzie [Mackenzie of Kintail]. This turned to the ruin of divers of the undertakers, who were exhausted in means before they took the enterprise in hand, and had not the power which was required in a business of that importance.’—Spot.

It will be found that there was a third attempt to plant the Lewis. See under 1609.

Aug.

1605.

Mr Gilbert Brown, called Abbot of New Abbey, had for many years escaped the law while exercising his functions as a priest in the neighbourhood of Dumfries. The Presbyterian historians stigmatise him as ‘a famous excommunicat, forfaulted, perverting papist,’ who ‘kept in ignorance almost the haill south-west parts of Scotland,’ and was ‘continually occupied in practising against the religion.’ He was now taken prisoner by Lord Cranston, ‘not without peril from the country people, who rose to rescue him out of his hands.’ He was brought to Blackness, where, for a night, he was the fellow-prisoner of the recusant Presbyterian brethren. It is to be feared that community of misfortune did not bring the two parties into any greater harmony or charity with each other than they had hitherto been. When the government thus ‘took order’ with a papist priest, the only feeling of the zealous people on the other side was a jealous curiosity to see whether it was in earnest or not. The government, on its part, felt that it was on its good behaviour, and dreaded to be too lenient. Abbot Brown, being taken to Edinburgh Castle, was for some time entertained with an unpopular degree of mildness and liberality, his food being furnished at the king’s expense, and his friends being allowed to see him, while the Presbyterian captives were obliged to live at their own charges. Finally, the ‘excommunicat papist’ was allowed to quit the country with all his priestly furnishings, not without some suspicion of having been allowed to say mass in private before his departure.—Cal.

It is probable that this leniency was found to have been attended with the effect of exciting a troublesome degree of suspicion against the government, for another ‘priest, who had been a certain time in ward in the Tolbooth of Edinburgh, was (September 27, 1607) brought down on the mercat-day to the Mercat Cross, with all his mess clothes upon him, wherewith he was taken, with his chalice in his hand. He stayed at the Cross from ten hours till twelve. Then all his mess clothes and chalice were burned in a fire beside the Cross, and himself carried back to ward.’—Cal.

Oct. 3.

1605.

The Privy Council, sitting at Perth, dealt with a complaint from Mr Alexander Ireland, minister of Kincleven, against Sir John Crichton of Innernytie, who has already been introduced to our notice as a professor of the ancient faith. It appeared that the minister had had to adopt measures of discipline with Sir John ‘for halding of profane plays on the Sabbath-day, resetting of seminary priests, and divers other offences condemned by the word of God.’ The knight, rebelling against an authority which he bore in no reverence, had resented the interference with his personal freedom by going with an armed party to Ireland’s house and committing sundry outrages, even to the beating of his wife, though she was not far from her confinement. Owing to an imperfection of the record, the end of the affair is unknown.—P. C. R.

Nov. 5.

On the evening of this day, when the Gunpowder Plot was to have taken effect, a high wind produced some effects in the north of Scotland, which seemed in harmony with that wild affair. ‘All the inner stone pillars of the north side of the cathedral church at Dornoch (lacking the roof before), were blown from the very roots and foundation, quite and clean over the outer walls of the church; which walls did remain nevertheless standing, to the great astonishment of all such as have seen the same. These great winds did even then prognosticate and foreshew some great treason to be at hand; and as the devil was busy then to trouble the air, so was he busy, by these his firebrands, to trouble the estate of Great Britain.’—G. H. S.

The Privy Council issued sundry proclamations ‘anent the Poulder Treason,’ one for the apprehension of Percy, the prime conspirator. There was a general joy in Scotland at the detection of the plot. In Aberdeen, the people repaired to the church to give formal thanks for the deliverance of the royal family and nobility. Bonfires were lighted on the public ways, and the people went about for an afternoon, singing psalms of thankfulness. The magistrates and others had also a public banquet at the market-cross, where glasses were ‘drunk and cassen,’ in token of their rejoicing for the said merciful delivery.—Ab. C. R.

1606. Jan. 21.

The Earl of Errol wrote from Perth to the king, promising, in compliance with a command just received, to be ‘careful to provide ane tercel311 to the hawk of Foulsheuch,’ and to be ‘answerable to your majesty for the same, in case the auld tercel be dead.’ Foulsheuch is a sea-cliff about four miles south of Stonehaven, 200 feet in height, where so lately as 1808 a family of hawks, of uncommonly large size, continued to build. James’s love of what old Gervase Markham calls the ‘most princely and serious delight’ of hawking, caused him to keep up a constant correspondence with friends in Scotland for the supply of the needful birds, and of this the earl’s letter is a specimen. His lordship goes on with laudable particularity: ‘Your majesty’s mongrel falcon, whilk I have, sould have been at your hieness lang or now [ere now], but that as my falconer was ready to tak his journey, she contracted ane disease, wherewith he durst not adventure to travel her, in respect of the great frosts and storms. I will be answerable to your majesty that she has been in nae ways stressed, but as weel treated as any hawk could be. Naither shall your majesty suspect that I have reteinit her for my awn plesure, whilk I sall never compare in the greatest thing whatsoever with your majesty’s meanest contentment, nor am I able as yet, even at this present, to travel upon the fields for any game. Albeit, how soon it sall be possible that the hawk may in any sort be travellit, she sall be at your majesty with all diligence. She had the same sickness the last year, in this same season, and was not free of it till near March.’312

So keenly interested was James respecting the tercel of Foulsheuch, that he had written to the Earl of Mar regarding it; and this nobleman replied on the same date with Lord Errol, assuring the king that he will see after it carefully. ‘I cannot as yet,’ he says, ‘certify your majesty whether he be alive or not, but, within few days, I think, I sall go near to get the certainty that may be had of so oncertain a matter.’

There is extant a characteristic letter written by James at Perth in March 1597, to Fraser of Philorth, regarding a bird of sport. ‘Hearing that ye have ane gyre-falcon, whilk is esteemed the best hawk in all that country, and meetest for us that have sae guid liking of that pastime, we have therefore taken occasion effectuously to requeest and desire you, seeing hawks are but gifting geir, and nae otherwise to be accounted betwix us and you, being sae well acquainted, that of courtesy ye will bestow on us that goshawk, and send her here to us with this bearer, our servant, whom we have on this errand directed to bring and carry her tenderly. Wherein, as he sall report our hearty and special thanks, sae sall ye find us ready to requite your courtesy and good-will with nae less pleasure in any the like gates [ways] as occasion sall present.’

Mar. 29 and 30.

1606.

The equinoctial gale of this year is described by a contemporary chronicler as of extreme violence. He says, with regard to the two days marginally noted: ‘The wind was so extraordinary tempestuous and violent, that it caused great shipwreck in Scotland, England, France, and the Netherlands. It blew trees by the roots, ruined whole villages, and caused the sea and many rivers so to overflow their wonted limits and bounds, that many people and chattels were drowned and perished.’—Bal.

An outbreak of touchiness on heraldic matters, which recently took place in Scotland, excited some surprise amongst English statesmen and others. It is certain, however, that wherever two nations are associated under one monarchy, the smaller usually manifests no small amount of jealousy regarding its national flag and every other thing which marks its distinction and may have been associated with the national history. The government of Sweden is at this day under constant anxiety regarding the rampant lion and battle-axe of the Norwegian flag, lest on any occasion due honour should not be paid to it, and feelings of international hostility be thereby engendered.

Apr. 12.

When the Scottish king added England and Ireland to his dominions, his native subjects manifested the utmost jealousy regarding their heraldic ensigns; and some troubles in consequence arose between them and their English neighbours, especially at sea. We find that at this time, ‘for composing of some difference between his subjects of North and South Britain travelling by seas, anent the bearing of their flags, and for avoiding all such contentions hereafter,’ the king issued a proclamation, ordaining ‘the ships of both nations to carry on their main-tops the flags of St Andrew and St George interlaced, and those of North Britain in their stern that of St Andrew, and those of South Britain that of St George.’—Bal.

May 17.

1606.

In an early and rude state of society, bankruptcy is always looked on with harshness, and punished cruelly; and perhaps it is really then less excusable than it becomes when commerce is more advanced, and the returns of transactions can less certainly be calculated on. Even Venice in old times had its stone of shame for bankrupts. Well, then, might Edinburgh have one in 1606. At the date noted in the margin, the Privy Council ordered the magistrates of that city to erect ‘ane pillory of hewen stone near the Mercat Cross; upon the head thereof ane seat to be made, whereupon in time coming sall be set all dyvours,313 wha sall sit thereon ane mercat-day, from ten hours in the morning till ane hour after dinner.’314 The unfortunates were obliged to wear a yellow bonnet on these occasions, and for ever after—the livery of slavery in the middle ages, and of which we have a relic in the under-clothes of the Christ’s Hospital boys in London.

An act of the Lords of Session in 1688 is more particular regarding the indignities to be visited upon dyvours. It ‘ordains the magistrates of the burgh (where the debtor is incarcerated), before his liberation out of prison, to cause him take on, and wear upon his head, a bonnet, partly of a brown, and partly of a yellow colour, with uppermost hose, or stockings, on his legs, half-brown and half-yellow coloured, conform to a pattern delivered to the magistrates of Edinburgh, to be keeped in their Tolbooth; and that they cause take the dyvour to the Mercat Cross, betwixt ten and eleven o’clock in the fore noon, with the foresaid habit, where he is to sit upon the dyvour-stone, the space of ane hour, and then to be dismissed; and ordains the dyvour to wear the said habit in all time thereafter; and in case he be found either wanting or disguising the samen, he shall lose the benefit of his bonorum.’315

July 1.

A parliament met at Perth, chiefly with a view to re-instating the bishops in those revenues which alone could make them efficient in their office. They themselves appeared for the first time during many years in a style calculated to impress the senses of the people. The king had taken care that they, as well as the nobility, should wear ceremonial dresses.316 In the ‘riding’ or equestrian procession to the parliament house, they took their place immediately after the earls, ‘all in silk and velvet footmantles, by pairs, two and two, and St Andrews, the great Metropolitan, alone by himself, and ane of the ministers of no small quality, named Arthur Futhie, with his cap at his knee, walkit at his stirrup along the street.’ ‘This was called the Red Parliament, whilk in old prophecies was talked many years ago sould be keepit in St Johnston, because all the noblemen and officers of estate came riding thereto and sat therein, with red gowns and hoods, after the manner of England, for ane new solemnity; whilk many did interpret a token of the red fire of God’s wrath to be kindled both upon kirk and country.’—Ja. Mel.

1606.

At this parliament appeared two western nobles between whose families there had long subsisted great enmity—namely, the Earls of Eglintoun and Glencairn. Notwithstanding the known anxiety of the king for an oblivion of all such ‘deidly feids,’ the two earls and their respective attendants came to a collision on the street. ‘It lasted fra seven till ten hours at night, with great skaith,’ one man of the Glencairn party being slain outright. It was not without great exertion on the part of the citizens that the tumult was quelled.

This feud, which was of early origin, acquired fresh stimulus from the murder of the Earl of Eglintoun by Cunningham of Robertland in 1586, the Earl of Glencairn, as head of the Cunninghams, being held as in some degree answerable for, and bound to protect, the actual assassin. The affair now involved the Lord Semple and other men of consequence in the west, and it took no small pains on the part of the king and his Scottish ministers to get it composed.

The reconciliation of the Earl of Glencairn with Lord Semple took place in a formal and public manner, at the command of the Privy Council, nearly three years afterwards (May 22, 1609). The scene of this important transaction was the Green of Glasgow. On the occasion, ‘for eschewing of all inconvenients of trouble whilk may happen (whilk God forbid!),’ the town-council arranged that the provost with one of the bailies and whole council should go to the place, attended by forty citizens in arms, while the other two bailies, each attended by sixty of the citizens with ‘lang weapons and swords,’ should ‘accompany and convoy the said noblemen, with their friends, in and out, in making their reconciliation.’—M. of G.

July.

Glasgow—now a city of 400,000 inhabitants, and the scene of a marvellous concentration of the industrial energies of the nineteenth century—how curious to look in upon it in 1606! when it was only a small burgh and university town, containing perhaps 5000 inhabitants at the utmost, some of them merchants (that is, shopkeepers), others craftsmen—not such folk, however, as would now be found carrying on trade and the useful arts in a burgh of the same size, but men accustomed to the use of arms, and the exercise of the violent passions which call arms into use—not inspired with the independent political ideas of our time, but trained to look up to the great landlords of their neighbourhood as leaders to be in all things followed: in short, a small burgal community, retaining a strong tinge of the old feudal system.

July 5.

1606.

The city was at this time the scene of ‘a very great trouble and commotion,’ arising from a change which had been made in the system of municipal election. The change seems to have been effected in legal and proper manner by Sir George Elphinstone, the provost; but it was odious to a neighbouring knight, Sir Matthew Stewart of Minto, whose ancient local influence it threatened to subvert. He accordingly wrought upon the ‘crafts’ of the burgh, till he induced them to believe that the new system was a gross tyranny to their order. They consequently held a meeting in the house of a citizen—an act unlawful, without the sanction of the magistrates—ostensibly to get up a petition, but in reality armed for action with swords, targes, and other abulyiements. Climbing up to the platform of the Market Cross, they proclaimed their remonstrance against the new arrangements, in the sight of the magistrates, who sat in their council-house close by. It was believed that the object of the insurgents was to provoke the magistrates to come out and interfere with their proceedings; which might have been made a pretence for involving them in a murderous quarrel. But ‘God furnished the magistrates with patience to abide all their indignities.’ They even so far deferred to the popular party, as to appoint a day when they might meet and argue out their differences.

1606.

According to the provost and magistrates, in a complaint which they sent to the Privy Council, this peaceful measure did not suit the views of Sir Matthew Stewart and his friends. Accordingly, ‘knawing that, upon the twenty-three day of the month, whilk was the day preceding the appointit time of meeting, Sir George was to go to the archery, they made choice of that time and occasion, to work their turn.’ Sir Walter Stewart, son of Sir Matthew, with John and Alexander Stewarts, ‘lay in wait for him and his company, wha were but five in number, without ony kind of armour, saufing their bows; and perceiving them, about seven hours at even, come up the Dry-gate, of purpose to have passed to the Castle butts, and there to have endit their game, and James Forrat, ane of Sir George’s company, going to his awn house with his bow disbendit in his hand, to have fetchit some Bute arrows; Sir Walter thought meet to mak the first onset upon him, and thereby to draw Sir George back.’ The assault upon Forrat having caused a great cry to arise, Sir George returned through the Castle port to learn what was the matter, when, meeting young Minto in the act of pursuing the unarmed man, he remonstrated first in gentle words, and then in language more emphatic, finally commanding him in the king’s name to desist and go home. Hereupon a party of forty, all armed with steel bonnets, secrets, plait sleeves, ‘lang staffs,’ and other weapons, issued from the wynd-head, where they had been concealed, and, joining with young Minto, drove Sir George and his small party of friends back to the Castle port, where they were happily relieved from present danger. Being thus disappointed of their purpose, the rioters retired to the wynd-head, and presently sent off one of their number down the High Gait to rouse the other citizens. This man, James Braidwood, ran along crying, ‘Arm you! arm you! They are yokit!’ whereupon a great number of the seditious faction, including Sir Matthew Stewart of Minto himself, assembled in arms, and joining the other party at the wynd-head, came in full force, and in the most furious manner to the Castle, where, but for the interposition of the Earl of Wigton and two other privy-councillors, who were present, they would certainly have slain their provost. ‘Seeing they could not win towards Sir George with lang staffs and weapons, they despitefully cast stanes at him.’ Then, refusing to obey the commands of the privy-councillors to go peaceably home, ‘they past tumultuously down the gait to the Barras Yett, far beneath the Cross, and come up the gait again with three hundred persons, with drawn swords in their hands, some of the rascal multitude crying: “I sall have this buith, and thou sall have that buith!” and of new assailit the Castle port, with full purpose by force to have enterit within the same.’ It was alleged that, but for the courageous resistance of the three noble privy-councillors, they would have accomplished the destruction of Sir George Elphinstone on this occasion. As it was, they laid violent hands on three several magistrates who came to his help, altogether ‘committing manifest insolency and insurrection within the said city, to the great trouble and inquietation thereof, and ane evil example to others to do the like hereafter.’

1606.

Such was the Elphinstone story regarding this tumult. It was, however, met by a counter-complaint from young Minto, to the following effect. He was, he said, ‘coming down the Rotton Raw, in peaceable and quiet maner to his awn lodging, accompanit only with twa servants,’ when ‘he perceivit Sir George Elphinstone with nine or ten persons in his company, coming up the Dry Gait.’ Although he was in the straight way for his lodging, ‘yet in respect of some dryness between Sir George and him, he left that gait, and past ane other way, of purpose to have eschewit all occasion of trouble and unquietness betwixt them.’ Here, however, ‘James Forrat, ane of Sir George’s company, cast him directly in the complainer’s way, and pressit to have stayit his passage.’ When young Minto ‘soberly found fault with him,’ Forrat ‘immediately bendit his bow, and had not failed to have shot and slain him, were not ane in company with the complainer cuttit the bow-string.’ Whereupon, according to the recital, Sir George Elphinstone and his servants fell upon young Minto and his servants in the most violent manner with their swords, and would certainly have slain them, if they had not by God’s providence escaped.—P. C. R.

We learn from another source, that, after all, ‘the skaith was not great; only ane man callit Thomas Cloggy died, without ony wound, and sundry hurt with staves.’317

The government authorities must have felt puzzled by this local squabble, and hardly known how to apportion punishment amongst the parties. The Minto knights were ordered into ward in Dumbarton Castle, and Sir George Elphinstone in the castle of Glasgow, till his majesty’s pleasure should be known. The Privy Council afterwards absolved young Minto from the charge of being the aggressor in the conflict of the 23d July; but the two knights and their principal supporters were confined for some time in Linlithgow, on account of the general ‘insolency’ of which they had been guilty.

1606. Aug.

There is something affecting in the history of the families concerned in this tumult. A mural tablet in Glasgow cathedral commemorated the names of six or eight Stewarts of Minto in succession, ‘knights created under the banner,’ and men of great sway in the district. But when M‘Ure wrote his History of Glasgow in 1736, the family was ‘mouldered so quite away, that the heir in our time was reduced to a state of penury little short of beggary.’ A memorandum of Paton, the antiquary, queried, ‘If true that the last of the family was a poor boy sent into Edinburgh barefooted with a letter to Stewart of Coltness, who [being] promising, was recommended to the Duke of Hamilton, got some education, and afterwards went abroad to Darien, where he died.’ Sir George Elphinstone, who had been the familiar servant and friend of King James, acquired a great estate at Glasgow, and after this time rose to be Lord Justice-clerk, nevertheless ‘died so poor, that his corpse was arrested by his creditors, and his friends buried him privately in his own chapel adjoining his house.’ His family went out in the second generation.

While the attention of the people was absorbed by the matter of the bishops and their robes and renewed dignity, the consequences of the continual neglect of those natural conditions on which their physical health depended were about to be once more and most severely felt. The pest broke out and spread over the more populous districts with frightful rapidity. ‘It raged so extremely in all the corners of the kingdom, that neither burgh nor land in any part was free. The burghs of Ayr and Stirling were almost desolate; and all the judicatories of the land were deserted.’—Bal. It was not till the middle of winter that it sensibly declined.

The chancellor wrote to the king in October, that scarcely any part of the country was free of the scourge. ‘This calamity,’ he says, ‘hinders all meetings of Council, and all public functions for ministration of justice and maintenance of good rule and government, except sic as we tak at starts, with some few, at Edinburgh, or in sic other place for a day, to keep some countenance of order.’

The unconforming clergy now imprisoned at Blackness wrote a petition for mercy to the king (August 23), in which they describe the state of the country under its present affliction. They speak of ‘the destroying angel hewing down day and night continually, in sic a number in some of our congregations, that the like thereof has not been heard many years before.’ They add: ‘What is most lamentable, they live and die comfortless under the fearful judgment, filling the heaven and the earth with their sighs, sobs, and cries of their distressed souls, for being deprived not only of all outward comforts (whilk were great also), but also of all inward consolation, through the want of the ordinary means of their peace and life, to wit, the preaching of the word of our ministry.’318

1606.

We have a remarkable trait of the treatment of the pest in outlying districts, in a bond granted on this occasion by some Aberdeenshire gentlemen to the burgh of Dundee for five hundred merks, as requital for their sending two professional clengers from their town to the valley of the Dee, that they might deal with an infection which had fallen forth in the house of Mr Thomas Burnet, minister of Strathauchan, and in the house of John Burnet of Slowy—two places divided by the river, but both on the line of the great road leading from the south to the north of Scotland. The country gentlemen, on hearing of the infection in their district, had been obliged to convene and devise measures for meeting the calamity.

Their first step was to send for two clengers a hundred miles off to come with all speed, although at a high cost, which the gentlemen, as we see, were obliged to pay in behalf of themselves and neighbours.319

Another trait of the public economy regarding this pestilence occurs in the record of the Privy Council. It was represented to that august body on the 2d of September, that ‘certain lodges’ had been ‘biggit by James Lawrieston and David and George Hamiltons, upon the common muir of Gogar, for the ease and relief of certain their tenants, infectit with the pest;’ but Thomas Majoribanks, portioner of Ratho, and other persons had cast down these lodges, apparently on the plea that the erecting of them was an intrusion on their property. The Council found that the muir was common property, and ordered the lodges to be rebuilt by those who had originally set them up, on the part of the muir nearest to their own grounds, ‘where they may have the best commodity of water,’ the other party being at the same time forbidden to interfere under heavy penalties.—P. C. R.

Sep. 4.

The Chancellor Dunfermline intimated to the king the pitiful case of the inhabitants of Dumbarton, their town being unable to defend themselves against ‘the surges and inundations of the sea, which is likely to destroy and tak away their haill town, and cannot be repulsit by nae moyen their poor ability and fortunes are able to furnish.’ Those who were appointed to inquire into the matter now reported that it would require at least thirty thousand pounds Scots to make a proper bulwark. It was proposed to defray this charge by a tax on the country.320

Sep.

1606.

‘George, Earl of Dunbar, his majesty’s commissioner for ordering the Borders, took such a course with the broken men and sorners [there], that, in two justiciary-courts halden by him, he condemned and caused hang above a hundred and forty of the nimblest and most powerful thieves in all the Borders ... and fully reduced the other inhabitants there to the obedience of his majesty’s laws.’—Bal. The chancellor told the king next month that the Borders were now ‘satled, far by onything that ever has been done there before.’321

It was declared a few months later (November 20), that one of the principal difficulties experienced by the emissaries of government in executing justice on the Borders lay in the strength of the houses in which the ‘thieves and limmers’ dwelt or took refuge, and particularly the ‘iron yetts’ with which these houses were furnished. The Privy Council therefore ordained that all iron yetts in houses belonging to persons below the rank of barons, should be ‘removit and turnit in plew irons or sic other necessar wark as to the awners sall seem expedient.’—P. C. R.

These iron gates, of which many specimens still survive in ancient country-houses in Scotland, are composed grill-wise, the bars curiously interlacing with each other, and generally with huge staples and padlocks. Such a gate, made in 1568 for Kilravock Castle, Nairnshire, by George Robertson, smith in Elgin, weighed thirty-four stone three pounds, and cost ‘£34, 3s. 9d. usual money, together with three bolls meal, ane stane butter, and ane stane cheese.’322

Nov. 7.

The six clergymen who had been tried for treason, on account of their refusal to break up the General Assembly at Aberdeen, and who had been condemned to banishment, were sent forth of the kingdom at Leith, after a long confinement in Blackness Castle. The punishment, it may be remarked, would have been remitted if they would have acknowledged their alleged offence and come in the king’s will.

1606.

‘The 6 of November, about four afternoon, they were desired to come to the boat whilk was prepared for them by the water-bailie of Leith and Edinburgh; who, obeying, came, accompanied with some of their dearest friends and wives, to the pier, where there was a good number of people waiting on, to tak the guid-night at them, and to see them; but after their coming thither, Mr John Welch conceived a prayer, whilk bred great motion in the hearts of all the hearers. Prayers ended, they took guid-night of their friends, wives, and many other weel-wishers who were present, [and] entered into the boat, where they remained a guid space waiting on the skipper.’ The skipper not being ready to weigh that night, ‘they were desired by the water-bailie either to go aboard and lie in the ship that night, or else to go to their lodging, and be ready at the next call.

‘They, by God’s special providence, chused to go to their lodging; for that night came on a great storm, [so] that the ship was forced to save herself in Kinghorn road all that night. They were called again by two hours in the morning, who, obeying, came to the shore and pier, accompanied as the night before, no small concourse of people being with them, beyond expectation, so early to see them boat. Prayer conceived as before by Mr John Welch, they embarked, giving many exhortations to all to hold fast the truth of the doctrine whilk they had delivered; for the whilk they doubted nothing to lay down their lives, let be to suffer banishment; adding thereto, that whilk they suffered was the great joy of their conscience. In the meantime, the mariners hasted them away ... they departed out of our sight, making us hear the comfortable joy whilk they had in God, in singing a psalm.’323

1606.

While Protestant clergymen of the puritan type were thus suffering, and evoking by their fortitude the deserved sympathy and admiration of large masses of their countrymen, they were so far from being alone in martyrdom, that suffering was inflicted upon another class of religionists, if not at their dictation, at least with their full approval. The Earl of Angus, one of the three Catholic lords whose correspondence with Spain caused so much trouble sixteen years before, had since lived at home in quietness and obedience. It was not many months after the embarkation of the six Presbyterian ministers at Leith, that we find his lordship pleading that, to avoid imprisonment for his religion, he might be allowed to go into exile—thus calling for the punishment inflicted upon the six clergymen, as a kind of relief from the more severe penalties demanded against him by the party to which these clergymen belonged. In a letter to the king, August 10, 1608, adverting to the fact of the General Assembly having given forth an act for his immediate excommunication, he says: ‘What grief and sorrow this brings to my heart, God knows; because my greatest care has ever been, and sall be, that I might end my days (whilk, I am persuaded, will not be many) at peace with God, and in your majesty’s obedience.... The permission whilk of grace only I crave (gif it please not your hieness to ease me with a better) is either to depart this country ... with surety not to return, or else that it wald please your majesty to confine me in ane of mine awn houses, and so mony miles about the same, where I am glad to live as ane private subject, and never to meddle me with public affairs, but by your majesty’s direction.’

The earl was compelled to leave his country, and he died at Paris three years after, aged fifty-seven. In his epitaph, he is made to say—‘jussus, religionis causâ, patriâ excedere aut in custodiam pergere, vitæ quietiori turbinibus averruncandis delegeram Galliam, caram alteram Scotis patriam.’

The utter unconsciousness of the persecuted Presbyterians of there being any harm in visiting the papists with the like severities might almost provoke a smile. While the six ministers lay in expectation of banishment, their brethren detained in England received a visit from Law, Bishop of Orkney. The conversation turned on the present state of the church in Scotland, and the bishop endeavoured to convince them that the royal policy was right, as the same Linlithgow convention which had condemned the six recusant ministers had ‘taken strait order with the papists.’ Seeing they appeared to have no great faith in that demonstration, the bishop endeavoured to reassure them. ‘They shall call me a false knave,’ said he, ‘and never to be believed again, if the papists be not sae handled as they never were in Scotland.‘324

Dec. 23.

The Privy Council had some time ago issued a proclamation, forbidding what was called the backing of pairties to the bar—that is, each party in a lawsuit coming into court with a number of friends and favourers behind him, with a view to exercising some influence over the course of justice. Finding that the former denouncement of ‘this indecent and unseemly custom’ had not been attended with any effect, partly through the public being unacquainted with it, and partly through the negligence of the officers of the law, the Council now renewed their proclamation, with assurance that their orders would in future be strictly acted upon. The reader will find that the practice continued in force some years later.—P. C. R.

1607. Jan. 20. 1606.

At this time, Gordon of Gight, Forbes of Corsindae, and some others, formed themselves into what they called the Society of the Boys—much after the manner perhaps of the White Boys of Ireland, in more recent times. They bound themselves by oath to consider all quarrels as common amongst them, and are accused of having committed ‘open and avowed reifs, herships, and other enormities, in all parts where they be maisters and commanders.’ All this appears from a letter of the Privy Council, of date January 20, 1607, to the Marquis of Huntly, commanding him to take order for their suppression, ‘as your lordship wald eschew that hard censure and construction which his majesty maun mak of your behaviour in this point.’

It will be remembered that Gight was a Catholic, and the probability is that this fraternity of the Boys was simply a desperate effort on his part and that of his co-religionists to repel, as far as they could, the persecutions to which they were subjected.

However this might be, we soon after (April 2) find the Council engaged in trying to bring George Gordon of Gight to justice for sundry popish practices of which he was alleged to have been guilty. It was charged against him that, at the burial of his mother, Isobel Ochterlony, on a particular day in the year 1604, he had caused his tenant, David Wilson, to ‘carry ane crucifix upon ane speir immediately before the corpse;’ in like manner, at the burial of the late William Gordon of Gight in 1605, he had caused George Crawford, his servant, to ‘bear ane crucifix upon ane speir the haill way before the body;’ he being personally present on both occasions: ‘whereby, as he has offendit God, slanderit his kirk and haly ministry, sae he has committit a very great contempt against his majesty, and has violate his hieness’ laws and acts of parliament.’ The laird and his two dependents having failed to appear on several former occasions, the officers of justice were now directed to go to them, and command them to enter as prisoners in Edinburgh Castle within fifteen days, on pain of rebellion.—P. C. R.

The immediate results of these measures do not appear. Seven years after (February 1614), we learn that the Lairds of Gight and Newton, both Gordons, and both Catholics, were sentenced by the Privy Council to perpetual banishment, and ‘never to set foot in Scotland under pain of death, unless they submit themselves to the orders of the church;’ that is, embrace the Protestant faith as professed in Scotland.

However it was as to their faith, the Gight Gordons are found in their usual place in Aberdeenshire only two years after this time. See under December 1615.

Apr. 1607. June 2.

The pest broke out again in Dundee, Perth, and other parts of the country.—Ab. C. R.

The Privy Council refer to ‘a very ancient and lovable custom,’ of giving a blue gown, purse, and as many Scotch shillings as agreed with the years of the king’s age, to as many ‘auld puir men’ as likewise agreed with the king’s years; and seeing it to be ‘very necessary and expedient that the said custom should be continuit,’ they give orders accordingly.—P. C. R.

The ‘auld puir men’ so favoured were called the King’s Bedesmen, and were privileged to go about the country as beggars, notwithstanding any general enactments that might exist against mendicancy. Their blue cloak bore a pewter badge which assured them of this right. They were expected to requite the king’s bounty by their prayers; and, doubtless, as they had such an interest in the increase of his years, their intercessions for his prolonged life must have been sincere. The distribution of their cloaks and purses used to take place on the king’s birthday, at the end of the Tolbooth of Edinburgh, till a time not long gone by.

June 30.

A sad account is given of the country of Athole. This province, ‘whilk of auld was maist quiet and peaceable, and inhabit be a number of civil and answerable gentlemen, professed and avowed enemies to thieves, robbers, and oppressors,’ is described as having ‘now become very louss and broken,’ ‘ane ordinary resett for the thieves and broken men of the north and south Hielands;’ moreover, a great number of the native people, ‘sic as John Dow M’Gillicallum and his complices,’ shaking off all fear of God and reverence for his majesty and the laws, ‘are become maist insolent, committing wild and detestable murders, open reifs, privy stouthrie, barbarous houghing and goring of oxen, and other enormities,’ without hinderance or challenge.

Aug.

The Privy Council ordered the immediate reappointment of a guard or watch for the country, such as was customary. James Gordon of Lesmoir undertook to apprehend John Dow and his brother Allaster; and when many attempts had failed, ‘in end lichtit upon the limmers.’ ‘After a lang and het combat, and the slauchter of four or five of the principals of them, the said Allaster was apprehendit, and John, being very evil hurt, by the darkness of the night escaped.’ Allaster, who had many murders on his head, was brought to Edinburgh, and laid in irons in the Tolbooth, notwithstanding many offers from his friends for his liberation. He was in due time tried and executed.—P. C. R.

1607.

David, Master of Crawford, was noted as a wicked and lawless man. In the course of his violent proceedings in the district where he possessed influence—Forfarshire—he had slaughtered (October 25, 1605) Sir Walter Lyndsay of Balgavies. This brought out the violent feelings of the young Laird of Edzell, whom we have already seen engaged in matters of blood. Young Edzell and his brother determined to avenge the slaughter of their uncle, Sir Walter, upon the Master of Crawford, who was also their near relation.

July 5.

One summer evening, between nine and ten o’clock, the Master of Crawford was walking up the High Street of Edinburgh, accompanied by his uncle, Alexander, Lord Spynie, and Sir James Douglas of Drumlanrig. Lord Spynie was a popular character, a favourite courtier of King James, and uncle to both the Master of Crawford and young Edzell. Knowing the revengeful design of the latter person, he had been endeavouring to bring about a peace between him and the Master; but his well-meant efforts were destined only to result in his own death. At this very time young Edzell was lying in wait with eight armed men to attack the Master. The three gentlemen approach, and are in a moment beset by the ambushed party; sword-strokes and pistol-shots are exchanged; the Master and Drumlanrig are severely wounded, and Lord Spynie receives mortal hurt. Young Edzell then withdrew his party.

Drumlanrig recovered from his wounds with difficulty; Lord Spynie died of his in eleven days. Thus the innocent alone suffered from this attempt at ‘wild justice;’ the very kind of event which wild justice is most apt to bring about, and for which it is chiefly to be condemned.

Young Edzell fled, with the dismal pain upon his conscience of having caused the violent death of his own uncle, whom he had ever regarded with affection. To escape justice, he was compelled to retire to the remotest parts of his paternal property in the Braes of Angus. Meanwhile, his father suffered great harassment from the law on his account, and was soon brought down in sorrow to the grave. It cost the son a good estate and ten thousand merks to settle matters ultimately with the heirs of Lord Spynie.325

July.

A tragical event, which now occurred at Dornoch in Sutherland, is related in a characteristic manner by Sir Robert Gordon.

1607.

‘About the year 1585, there came into Sutherland one called Mr William Pape, a reasonable good scholar, and of a quick and ready wit. This man was first admitted to be schoolmaster in the town of Dornoch; then he was appointed to be resident minister in that same place; and withal he came to be chanter of Caithness. In progress of time, by his virtue and diligence, he became wealthy, and of good account in the county of Sutherland. His two brethren, Charles and Thomas, perceiving his good success, came also thither out of Ross, where they were born, thinking to settle their fortunes with their elder brother. Thomas Pape was made chancellor of Caithness, and minister at Rogart. Charles Pape was a public notary, and a messenger-at-arms; who, being of an affable and merry conversation, did so behave himself that he procured the love of his master, the Earl of Sutherland, and the good liking of all his countrymen, so that in the end he was made sheriff-clerk of Sutherland. These three brethren married in Sutherland, and anchored their fortunes in that country; but as wealth and prosperity often beget pride, so doth pride bring with it a certain contempt of others. These brethren, dwelling for the most part in Dornoch, being both provident and wealthy, thought by progress of time to purchase and buy the most part of the tenements of that town, and drive the ancient and natural inhabitants from their possessions; which the townsmen in end perceiving, they grudged in their hearts, though they could take no just exceptions thereat, seeing that these brethren did purchase the same with their money; yet they concluded with themselves to utter their hatred and revenge when occasion should serve. So at last, upon a particular quarrel which began between one of these brethren, and one of the inhabitants of the town, their ruin thus followed:

1607.

‘Every man being departed from the town of Dornoch unto this convention at Strathullie [to resist an invasion of the Earl of Caithness], except William Moray, a bowyer, and some few others, who were also ready to go away the next morning. Mr William and Mr Thomas Pape, with some others of the ministry, had a meeting at Dornoch concerning some of the church affairs. After they had dissolved their meeting, they went to breakfast to an inn or victualling-house of the town. As they were at breakfast, one John Macphail entered the house and asked some drink for his money, which the mistress of the house refused to give him, thereby to be rid of his company, because she knew him to be a brawling fellow. John Macphail, taking this refusal in evil part, reproved the woman, and spoke somewhat stubbornly to the ministers, who began to excuse her; whereupon Thomas Pape did threaten him, and he again did thrust into Thomas’s arm an arrow with a broad-forked head, which then he held in his hand. So being parted and set asunder at that time, Mr William and his brother Thomas came the same evening into the churchyard, with their swords about them; which John Macphail perceiving, and taking it as a provocation, he went with all diligence and acquainted his nephew, Hutcheon Macphail, and his brother-in-law, William Moray the bowyer, therewith; who being glad to find this occasion whereby to revenge their old grudge against these brethren, they hastened forth, and meeting with them in the churchyard, they fell a quarrelling, and from quarrelling to fighting. Charles Pape had been all that day abroad; and at his return, understanding in what case his brethren were, he came in a preposterous haste to the fatal place of his end and ruin. They fought a little while; in the end, Charles hurt William Moray in the face, and thereupon William Moray killed him. Mr William and Thomas were both extremely wounded by John Macphail and his nephew Hutcheon, and were lying in that place for dead persons, without hope of recovery; but they recovered afterwards beyond expectation. The offenders escaped, because there was none in the town to apprehend them (except such as favoured them), the inhabitants being all gone to the assembly at Strathullie. John Macphail and his nephew Hutcheon have both since ended their days in Holland. William Moray yet lives (reserved, as I should suppose, to a greater judgment). Mr William Pape and his brother Thomas thereupon left the county of Sutherland, and settled themselves in Ross, where Thomas now dwelleth. Mr William died in the town of Nigg, where he was planted minister. Thus did these brethren begin and end in this country; which I have declared at length to shew us thereby that man in full prosperity should never think too much of himself, nor contemn others, upon whom it hath not pleased God to bestow such measure of gifts and benefits.’—G. H. S.

Aug. 5.

1607.

A parliamentary enactment had appointed the 5th of August to be kept as a holiday, on account of the king’s escape from the Gowrie treason. On this occasion, the day ‘was solemnly kept in Edinburgh. The king’s scoll [health] was drunk by the duke his commissioner, and some other noblemen, at the Cross of Edinburgh, which was covered for the greater solemnity. Bacchus was set up, and much wine drunk, and sweetmeats cast about; much vanity and pastime, beside ringing of bells, and setting on of balefires. The pest brake up soon after.‘—Cal.

The death of the late Lord Maxwell in the battle of Dryfe’s Sands left a feeling of deadly bitterness in his son’s mind against the name of Johnston. A series of turbulent proceedings, marking the untamable spirit of the young lord, ended in his being warded in the Castle of Edinburgh, where he had for a fellow-prisoner a Hebridean magnate of similar character and history—Sir James M‘Connel or Macdonald.

Dec. 4.

‘Seeing not how he was to be relieved, he devises with Sir James M’Connel and Robert Maxwell of Dinwoodie, what way he and they might escape. So, he calls ane great number of the keepers of the Castle into his chalmer, where he drinks them all fou.’ Pretending to act a sort of play, he asked them for their swords as part of the performance; and having thus armed himself and his two companions, he passed out with them, locking the door behind him. The three passed to the inner gate, where a servant stood in the way, holding the porter in parley. The latter, an old man, tried to make resistance. ‘False knave,’ cried Maxwell, ‘open the yett, or I shall hew thee in blads’ [pieces]. He did strike the man in the arm, and likewise wounded another keeper in the hand. Then he and Sir James ‘passed to the west castle-wall that goes to the West Port of Edinburgh,’ and climbing over it, leaped down, and disappeared amongst the suburbs. Robert Maxwell, however, was locked in and detained. The insular chieftain, who had irons upon him, was seized in an attempt to conceal himself in a dunghill, while Lord Maxwell escaped on a horse which had been kept in readiness for him. ‘The king was very far offended, and made proclamation that nane should reset him under the pain of death.’326

Nov.

‘A vehement frost continued from Martinmas till the 20th of February. The sea froze so far as it ebbed, and sundry went into ships upon ice and played at the chamiare a mile within the sea-mark. Sundry passed over the Forth a mile above Alloa and Airth, to the great admiration of aged men, who had never seen the like in their days.’—Cal.

1607.

The keenness and duration of this frost was marked by the rare occurrence of a complete freezing of the Thames at London, where accordingly a fair was held upon the ice. In Scotland, rivers and springs were stopped; the young trees were killed, and birds and beasts perished in great numbers. Men, travelling on their affairs, suffered numbness and lassitude to a desperate degree. Their very joints were frozen; and unless they could readily reach a shelter, their danger was very great. In the following spring, the fruit-trees shewed less growth than usual; and in many places the want of singing-birds was remarked.—Jo. Hist.

1608.

Apr. 6.

‘The Lord Maxwell, being proclaimed traitor after the breaking out of ward in the Castle of Edinburgh, and thereupon driven to great straits, sent to the Laird of Johnston, craved a meeting, pretending he would now be heartily reconciled with him, and not for the fashion, as he was before at the king’s pleasure, because he perceived he did not trouble him now, being an outlaw, as he looked for. They meet at the place appointed, Maxwell and one with him, Johnston and another with him; and Sir Robert Maxwell of Spotts (near cousin to the Lord Maxwell, and brother-in-law to the Laird of Johnston), who was employed by Maxwell to draw on the tryst. They meet on horseback, and salute each other heartily in outward show, and went apart to confer together. While Johnston and Maxwell are conferring apart, Maxwell’s second began to quarrel Johnston’s second, [and] shot a pistolet at him, whereupon he fell. Johnston, hearing the shot, cried “Treason!” and, riding from Maxwell to the two gentlemen, to understand what the matter meant, Maxwell shooteth him behind the back. So Johnston fell, and died of the shot. Soon after, proclamation was made at the Cross of Edinburgh, that none, under pain of death, transport or carry away the Lord Maxwell out of the country, in ship or craer, seeing the king and Council was to take order with him, for the traitorous murdering of the Laird of Johnston and his other offences.’—Cal.

‘The fact was detested by all honest men, and the gentleman’s misfortune sore lamented; for he was a man full of wisdom and courage, and every way well inclined, and to have been by his too much confidence in this sort treacherously cut off, was a thing most pitiful. Maxwell, ashamed of that he had done, forsook the country, and had his estate forfeited.’—Spot.

1608.

Horse-racing was early practised as a popular amusement in Scotland. In 1552, there was an arrangement for an annual horse-race at Haddington, the prize being, as usual, a silver bell. Early in the reign of James VI., there were races at both Peebles and Dumfries. The Peebles race was accustomed to take place on Beltane-day, the 1st of May; it was the chief surviving part of the festivities which had from an early period distinguished the day and place, and which were celebrated in the old poem of Peebles to the Play.

Apr. 28.

The great difficulty attending such popular festivals arose from the tendency of the people to mark them with bloodshed. Men assembled there from different parts of the country, each having of course his peculiar enmities, and the object of similar enmities in his turn; and when they met and had somewhat inflamed themselves with liquor, it was scarcely avoidable that mutual provocations should be given, leading to conflicts with deadly weapons. So great reason was there now for fearing a sanguinary scene at Peebles, that the Lords of Council thought proper to issue a proclamation forbidding the race to take place.327—P. C. R.

May 8.

1608.

This day commenced an unfortunate adventure of the king for obtaining silver in certain mines at Hilderstone in the county of Linlithgow. Some years before, a collier, named Sandy Maund, wandering about the burn-sides in that district, chanced to pick up a stone containing veins of a clear metal, which proved to be silver. A gentleman of Linlithgow, to whom he shewed it, recommended him to go to Leadhills, and submit it to Sir Bevis Bulmer, who was engaged in gold-seeking there. The consequence was, that a search was made at Hilderstone for silver, and, some very hopeful masses of ore being found, a commission was appointed by the king, with the consent of Sir Thomas Hamilton, his majesty’s advocate, the proprietor of the ground, for making a search for silver ore, with a view to trying it at the mint. In January 1608, thirty-eight barrels of ore, weighing in all 20,224 pounds, were won, packed, and sent to the Tower of London. It is said that this ore gave about twenty-four ounces of silver to every hundredweight, while some gave double this quantity. Samuel Atkinson, who was engaged in working the mine, tells that on some days he won as much silver as was worth £100. The shaft, indeed, received the name of God’s Blessing, as expressive of its fertile character. The whole results appearing favourable, the king’s cupidity was excited, and he easily fell into the proposal of his astute councillor, Hamilton, to become the purchaser of God’s Blessing for the sum of £5000, and work it at the public expense. Bulmer, created a knight, was its governor. There were ‘drawers up of metal, drawers up of water, and lavers up of water to the pumps under the ground, shedders and washers, washers with the sieve, dressers and washers with the buddle, and washers with the canvas, quarriers, shoolmen,’ and many other workers of different kinds. A mill for melting and fining the metal was established at Leith.328 Another fining-mill and a stamp-mill, with warehouses, were built on the water running out of Linlithgow loch. Some Brunswick miners were brought to give the benefit of their skill. All, however, was of no avail. From the time of the transference of the mine into royal hands, it did no more good. After a persevering effort of two years and a half, the king gave up the adventure, with a loss of a considerable sum of money.

The same mine was granted, in 1613, to Sir William Alexander, Thomas Foulis, and Paulo Pinto, a Portuguese, to be wrought by them on the condition of their paying a tenth of the refined ore to the crown. What success attended this adventure is not known.

The scene of the mining operations is still traceable in a hollow place to the east of Cairn-apple Hill, four miles south of Linlithgow. A neighbouring excavation for limestone is named from it the Silver-mine Quarry: such is the only local memorial of the affair now existing.329

May 31.

1608.

Margaret Hertsyde had entered the service of the queen in a humble capacity in Scotland, and accompanying her majesty to England, was there considerably advanced, and received from the queen many marks of favour. Enriched with the royal liberality, she returned to her native country as a great lady, attended by her husband, John Buchanan, who had been a servant of the king. The pair attracted an invidious attention by the high airs they gave themselves, affecting by the purchase of land to become persons of quality, appearing in a carriage drawn by white horses, and apparently wholly forgetful of their humble origin. It was therefore with no great regret that the public learned that Margaret was apprehended, on suspicion of having taken jewellery from her royal mistress, to the value of upwards of £400 sterling. The unfortunate woman confessed her guilt to the queen; but on her being brought to trial at Linlithgow, some technical difficulties arose as to how far a person could be considered guilty of theft who had only withheld unaccounted for certain articles of which she had been in trust. A direct conviction could not therefore be recorded. In these circumstances, by an irregularity which marks the character of the age, the king interfered with an order that Margaret Hertsyde be declared infamous and banished to Orkney. She was also adjudged to pay £400 sterling to the commissioner upon her majesty’s dotarial estate of Dunfermline. A grave historian of that day moralises upon the case as a sad example of the mutability of fortune.

In 1619, ‘her doom having been humbly and with great patience embraced and underlain by her, and her behaviour continually sin syne having been very dutiful,’ Margaret so far succeeded in obtaining the king’s grace as to have the reproach of infamy removed.—Pit. Jo. Hist.

June.

By slow and safe steps, King James was constantly working for the subjection of Scottish ecclesiastical matters to an episcopal model. At this time, his favourite Scottish minister, the Earl of Dunbar, came down from London, accompanied by two eminent English divines, Dr Abbot (subsequently Archbishop of Canterbury) and Dr Higgins, while a third, named Maxy, came by sea.

July 1.

1609.

On the approach of the earl and his clerical associates, ‘the noblemen, barons, and councillors that were in Edinburgh went out to accompany him into the town. So he entered in Edinburgh with a great train. The chancellor, then provost, the bailies, and many of the citizens, met him at the Nether Bow Port. It was spoken broadly that no small sums of money were sent down with him to be distributed among the ministers and sundry others. The English doctors seemed to have no other direction but to persuade the Scots that there was no substantial difference in religion betwixt the two realms, but only in things indifferent concerning government and ceremonies.’—Cal.

July 5.

Dundee is described as suffering under ‘the contagious sickness of the pest, and a great many of the houses are infectit therewith, and greater infection like to ensue in respect of the few number of magistrates within the same, and the little care and regard had of the government thereof, ane of the said magistrates being departit this life, and ane other of them visited with disease and infirmity, and not able to undergo sae great pains and travels in his person and otherwise as is requisite at sae necessar a time.’ For these reasons, the Privy Council appointed three citizens to act as assistant-magistrates.—P. C. R.

July 13.

We hear at this time of one of the last attempts to settle a dispute by regular combat; and it is the more remarkable, as several persons were concerned on each side. On the one part stood ‘the Lord Sinclair, David Seton of Parbroth, and John Sinclair elder and John Sinclair younger, sons to the said Lord Sinclair;’ on the other were George Martin of Cardone and his three sons. A mutual challenge had passed between the parties, ‘with special designation of time, place, form, and manner of the combat,’ and the rencontre would have, to all appearance, taken place, had not some neighbours interfered to prevent it. The parties were summoned before the Privy Council, to answer for their conduct.

Martin and his sons were denounced as rebels for not appearing (July 21).—P. C. R.

1608.

The slaughter of Captain James Stewart by Sir James Douglas of Parkhead, in 1596, had not been allowed to pass unnoticed by the Ochiltree family, to which the murdered man belonged. At that time, however, a man of rank was not to be punished as a malefactor in Scotland. His offence was expiated by an assythment, or the king interposed to reconcile the friends of the deceased to the culprit and his friends, as if the affair had been merely an unfortunate quarrel. For years there stood a variance between the Ochiltree Stewarts and the murderer of their relation, and from time to time they had to come under heavy sureties to keep the peace towards each other, Lord Ochiltree and Sir James Douglas (now called Lord Torthorald) in £5000 each; and the brothers and nephews of Stewart in lesser sums. This arrangement had been last renewed on the 30th of May, to endure for a year. All seemed composed—a General Assembly was sitting in Edinburgh—no one seems to have been apprehensive of any immediate quarrel or trouble, when a terrible incident suddenly fell out.

July 14.

Lord Torthorald was walking one morning, between six and seven o’clock, in the High Street, below the Cross, unaccompanied by any friend or servant, dreading no harm, when William Stewart, nephew of the man he had slain twelve years before, observing him, was unable to restrain the rancorous feeling of the moment, and pulling out a short sword he carried, stabbed him in the back, so that he fell to the ground and instantly died.

William Stewart escaped, and we hear no more of him. The Privy Council, horror-struck at the outrage, had two meetings on the same day to consider what should be done. At the first, before noon, they ordered that the Earl of Morton, James commendator of Melrose, Sir George and Sir Archibald Douglas, his uncles, —— Douglas now of Torthorald, William Douglas, apparent of Drumlanrig, Archibald Douglas of Tofts, and Sir James Dundas of Arniston—all friends of the deceased, and presumably eager to revenge his slaughter—should be confined to their lodgings. Lord Ochiltree, on whom the Douglases might be apt to vent their fury, was likewise commanded to keep within doors. At the second meeting, after noon, they gave an order for the apprehension of the culprit.

There is a remarkable connection of murders recalled by this shocking transaction. Not only do we ascend to Torthorald’s slaughter of Stewart in 1596, and Stewart’s deadly prosecution of Morton to the scaffold in 1581; but William Stewart was the son of the Sir William Stewart who was slain by the Earl of Bothwell in Blackfriars’ Wynd in 1588. This, however, is the last open murder of one gentleman by another which we have to record as taking place on a street in Edinburgh.

Lord Torthorald lies buried under a carved slab in Holyrood Chapel, where the guide reads his name daily to hundreds of visitors, few of whom know what a series of tragic circumstances in old Scottish history lies concentered in the body of him who sleeps below.

1608.

July.

The progress of persecution against the Catholics may be traced all through this period by the equal progress of the king’s measures for introducing the episcopal system into the church. A General Assembly, which met at Linlithgow in December 1606, was brought by court influence to give a consent to the principle of permanent moderators for presbyteries—a necessary step to the assumption of entire power over dioceses by the bishops. They sent the act to court, with a petition for fresh securities against the Catholic nobles of the north, and their ladies. James affected to listen to their desires, and promised well, but does not seem to have taken any decisive steps till he found that the act for constant moderators, as interpreted by him, met considerable resistance. He then called another General Assembly, mainly for the purpose of taking ‘strait order’ with the adherents of the proscribed faith.

This reverend body professed to consider the country as in unexampled danger from popery. It is found complaining that Jesuit and seminary priests were allowed to traffic within the land, that papistical books were brought from abroad, and that persons in authority often shewed favour to traffickers and excommunicated papists, ‘such as the abbot of New Abbey and other mass priests, demitted, as is thought, out of ward, not without reward [bribery], and without all warrant of his majesty, and presently tolerated in this country without pursuit.’ Amongst some objects petitioned for from the king, were—that papists of rank be imprisoned, and only Protestants have access to them; that orders be given for down-casting of the Laird of Gight’s chapel, and the house of John Cheyne in Kissilmonth, who receipted all Jesuits and seminary priests; and that order be taken with the pilgrimages—namely, to the Chapel called Ordiquhill, and the Chapel of Grace, and to a well in the bounds of Enzie upon the south side of Spey.

1608.

The most important of their actual measures bore reference to the Marquis of Huntly, and the Earls of Angus and Errol, who were considered as the prime supports of popery in the northern section of the kingdom. Huntly we have seen (June 1597) received formally and publicly into the Presbyterian Church, with all appearances of sincerity on his part, while the truth was that he only gave a lip-obedience in order to save his estates and place in the country, of which otherwise he would have been deprived. The hollowness of his professions was soon after sufficiently apparent, for he built a popish chapel in his house, and he continued, as before, to ‘reset’ priests. The Presbyterian tutors imposed on his family may be presumed to have made little progress in their work, as his children all grew up Catholics. Processes had been raised against him in the church-courts for ‘relapse in popery;’ and though the king had tried to screen him from the vengeance he had incurred, it was ineffectual. It was now necessary for James, if he would make way with his episcopal innovations, that he should give proof of sincerity in Protestantism, by leaving his old friend and councillor to the mercy of the General Assembly.

Accordingly, the business being ripe for instantly proceeding, the moderator—being the same Bishop Law who had promised such a sore ‘handling’ of the Catholics to James Melville and his friends in London (see under November 7, 1606)—pronounced the sentence of excommunication ‘after a very solemn manner;’ while the Earl of Dunbar, the king’s commissioner, promised that, ‘forty days being expired from the pronouncing of the sentence, the civil sword should strike without mercy or favour to him or his; and although some of his friends should come and buy his escheat, it should be refused.’—Cal. Arrangements were made for taking the same measures with Errol and Angus, Dunbar promising the like severity with them.

While the Assembly continued sitting, a gentleman came on behalf of the Marquis of Huntly, pleading for a little extension of time ‘till he had perfyter resolution,’ shewing that he was not opiniâtre, as had appeared from his ‘yielding to have conference,’ and from his ‘going to the kirk;’ he entreated to be heard for himself before final condemnation. But the petition was set aside as frivolous, and because he had failed to fulfil his promise given by solemn bond a month ago to communicate before a certain day.—Cal.