Note 212 — Miscellaneous Historical Documents, RELATIVE TO THE ECCLESIASTICAL AND POLITICAL EVENTS IN SCOTLAND—1639. (continued 2)

Folio MS., f. 74-75.—The looseness of Burnet and others who treat of this pacification, and the lack of dates to several of the documents, referable to the period of the negotiations, is apt to create uncertainty and indistinctness as to the several steps and stages in its progress; and it is somewhat difficult to fix the precise days on which some of the notes, &c. were written and communicated. Minute exactness in this respect is perhaps now but of small importance, (though historical truth depends much on chronological accuracy;) but attention to the following particulars enables us, with considerable certainty, to assign to the several documents their proper place.

The repulse of the King’s troops at Kelso took place on the 3d of June; and in the interval betwixt that day and the 7th, the Earl of Dunfermline was despatched from the Scotch to the King’s camp, with renewed supplications for opening negotiations. On the 7th, Sir E. Verney brought a message from the King, requiring his proclamation to be published; and it was read at General Leslie’s table on the 7th, when, accompanied by Dunfermline, Verney returned to the King’s camp with a favourable report. On the 8th, the King agreed to negotiate, and wrote a letter to that effect. On the 10th, (Burnet says the 11th,) the first meeting took place, and three more afterwards—viz., on the 12th, 15th and 18th—at the last of which the King’s Declaration was adjusted, and the articles of pacification agreed to.—Vide Baillie, vol. i. p. 179-183.