REIGN OF JAMES VI.: 1591-1603.
In this period we see a continuation of the struggles of the clergy for the independence of the kirk, and those of the king for a supremacy over it; the merciless measures for repressing the Catholic faith, and the desperate practices of the Catholics for relief; the weak rule of the king in all administrative matters; and the efforts of ambitious courtiers to gain an ascendency in his councils. The first transactions of any note were those arising from the condemnation and forfeiture of Stuart, Earl of Bothwell, an illegitimate cousin of the king, and nephew by his mother to the noted Hepburn, Earl of Bothwell, the murderer of Darnley. Conceiving himself to be simply a victim of the jealousy of the Chancellor Maitland, this vivacious noble was indisposed to submit to his doom; he thought, if he could reach the king’s ear, he might regain lost power and place. His consequent intrusions by night into the palace, and appearances at the head of armed parties in the field, form a strange chapter in the history of the period.
Our chronicle gives details of an unfortunate collision between the houses of Huntly and Moray, which resulted in the barbarous slaughter of the latter nobleman. The loss of public esteem which the king and the chancellor sustained through their suspected concern in this affair, and through the undoubted lenity which was shewn to the Earl of Huntly, reduced the government to such a degree of weakness, that it became necessary to give way somewhat to the demands of the clergy. To obtain their support, the episcopal arrangements of 1584 were in a great measure done away with (June 1592), and James himself passed a glowing eulogium on the Presbyterian system.
Towards the end of this year, new troubles arose, in consequence of the discovery of a treasonable correspondence between the Catholic nobles, Huntly, Errol, and Angus, with the king of Spain. These chiefs, finding themselves harassed beyond endurance by the now triumphant Presbyterians, who would allow them no freedom for the exercise of their religion, resorted to the desperate step of seeking assistance from a foreign and a Catholic sovereign. Under the urgency of Elizabeth and the kirk, James proceeded with vigour against these nobles, whose force he easily dispelled, and whom he prosecuted to forfeiture, but without meaning to effect their entire destruction. As a set-off to this procedure, he demanded that Elizabeth should cease to harbour and support his enemy the Earl of Bothwell. The English queen answered this with all smoothness, but in secret conspired with certain persons in Scotland for re-instating Bothwell in power. The unruly earl obtained by this means a temporary mastery over James (July, August 1593). The king, having contrived by craft and some share of resolution to emancipate himself, once more resumed his authority. In February 1593-4, while the queen lay in confinement after her first child, James mustered some forces, and met the Bothwell faction in the field. The rebels were overthrown, and Bothwell fell into a low and despicable state.
The general lawlessness of the country at this period, and the frightful atrocities which were almost daily committed, make some appearance in the chronicle. Amidst the universal broils, the Presbyterian clergy formed a virtuous element, zealous for an improvement of manners and the advance of the ‘evangel,’ but equally so in using means to force their own convictions upon others, and often interfering with matters which did not properly fall within their province. The rashness of the synod of Fife in excommunicating the papist lords (September 1593), and the freedom of speech which the members used in discussing and railing at the king’s slackness regarding the putting down of popery, gave James great disgust. He spoke sharply of their ‘proud enterprises,’ and declared he should re-erect the estate of bishops, for the purpose of correcting the insolence of the Presbyterian clergy, and suppressing the liberties which they were abusing.
The Catholic lords, being driven to extremities, collected their vassals and appeared in the field. A royal host under the youthful Earl of Argyle was sent to meet them, and in a bloody fight which took place at Glenlivet on the 3d of October 1594, they gained a victory. This, however, only made it necessary for the king to proceed in person with a larger host against them. He spent many weeks in the north, destroying their castles and harassing their vassalage, yet in his heart was far from coming up to that standard of severity against the ancient faith which would have conciliated the Presbyterian ministers. After a little time, the papist nobles yielded to pass into exile. The Earl of Bothwell, finding his case desperate, also left his native country, and, as it proved, for ever. He died in obscurity abroad.
A singular riot in Edinburgh in December 1596, of which an account is given in the chronicle, led to a reaction in favour of the king against the ultra-zealous Presbyterians. James was enabled to acquire considerable influence in the church-courts, to obtain seats in parliament for certain ministers, as representing the ancient bishops, and to secure a peaceable restoration for the popish lords. His brightening prospects of the English succession added to his power within Scotland, and the latter years of his Scottish reign were marked by comparatively few events of importance.
The most remarkable was the mysterious Gowrie Conspiracy (August 5, 1600). The young Earl of Gowrie and his brother Alexander Ruthven, sons of the Gowrie who suffered in 1584, appeared to have formed a plan to entrap the king, and by the possession of his person, to work out some project for placing themselves at the head of affairs. James was induced to visit their house at Perth by a tempting story about a man who knew of a concealed treasure. After dinner, he was conducted by Alexander Ruthven into a solitary room at the end of a long gallery, and put into the hands of an armed man. At the same time a false alarm was given to his attendants, that he had left the house, and was riding homeward. While they were hurrying to their horses in the court-yard, the king had a struggle with Ruthven, who first attempted to bind, and then to poniard him. With great difficulty, and not without the exercise of considerable presence of mind, he succeeded in giving an alarm to his attendants; one of whom, named John Ramsay, rushed to his rescue, and slew the two brothers on the spot. The death of the conspirators, and the very folly of their alleged plot, caused the tale of the king’s preservation to be received at the time, by a few persons, as an obscure and doubtful matter; and in this light it is still regarded by some; but a dispassionate estimate of probabilities will, we think, make the affair appear as a true, though foolish scheme of two hot-headed young men, animated partly by ambition, and partly by a feeling of revenge. Their bodies were dealt with as those of traitors on the same day (November 19) on which the king’s second son, afterwards Charles I., first saw the light.
1590-1. Jan. 7.
The imbecility of the king amidst his rude and quarrelsome courtiers, is strongly marked by several occurrences of this particular time. The Presbyterian historian tells us that, on the day noted on the margin, as his majesty was coming down the High Street from the Tolbooth, where he had been attending the administration of justice, his two chief friends, the Duke of Lennox and Lord Home, meeting the Laird of Logie, pulled out their swords and assaulted him. The quarrel was that Logie, a valet of the royal chamber, had refused to ‘ish’ at the duke’s order, till he was put out by force; whereupon he had given the duke foul words. While the two nobles set upon the valet, ‘the king fled into a close-head, and incontinent retired to a skinner’s booth, where it is said ... fear.’ Six days after, King James was sitting in the Tolbooth, hearing the case of the Laird of Craigmillar, who was suing a divorce against his wife, when the Earl of Bothwell forcibly took away one of the most important witnesses, carried him to Crichton Castle, and there threatened him with the gallows. It seemed ‘as if there had been no king in Israel.’—Cal.
1591.
Apr. 19
During this age of general violence, the rights of women were, as a matter of course, little respected. Abductions, both under the impulse of passion and from motives of cupidity, were frequent. The young Duke of Lennox, the cousin and favourite of the king, had contracted a violent attachment to Lady Sophia Ruthven, one of the numerous children left by the unfortunate Earl of Gowrie at his death in 1584. At the order of the king, the young lady was secluded from the duke’s resort at Easter Wemyss in Fife. The duke, crossing the Firth, took the Lady Sophia out of the house where she lived, and ‘carried her away on his awn horse all the night, and on the morn married the said gentlewoman, contrair the ordinance of the kirk; whereat the king was greatly commoved.’[183]—Jo. Hist.
In June 1593, an abduction, of which Plutus was the prompting deity, took place under extraordinary circumstances. A young lady, daughter and apparent heir of John Carnegie, had become an object of attention to James Gray, brother of that dexterous diplomat the Master of Gray, whose treachery has made him so noted a figure at this period of Scottish history. She had already been once in the hands of her disinterested lover, but rendered back to her father, at the command of the Council. She and her father were now living in the strong house of Robert Gourlay, the merchant, in Edinburgh, when a new and successful effort was made.
1591.
On a Sunday, being the 10th of June, Lord Home, who was one of the king’s chief courtiers, came to the High Street with an armed party, designed to repress any attempt at rescue. Thus favoured, Gray and his immediate accomplices took the young lady out of her home, and, dragging her down a narrow alley to the North Loch, crossed over with her to the other side, where ten or twelve men were ready to receive her. ‘They set her upon a man’s saddle, and conveyed her away, her hair hanging about her face.’ The ravisher was ‘a gentleman of the king’s bed-chamber!’
The magistrates of Edinburgh went to Holyrood on Tuesday to complain of this outrage. ‘The king desired to know if they could complean of any that was about him. In the meantime, my Lord Home, who was chief author of the riot, was standing by. They answered nothing, because they expected for no justice.’—Cal.
On the 6th of September 1594, Margaret Hay, a girl of only fourteen years, was forcibly taken from her mother’s house at Shiplaw, Peeblesshire, by Thomas Hay, brother of Hay of Smithfield, John and Thomas Govan, brothers, and ‘Willie Hay callit the Bastard.’ She was rescued by Cockburn of Skirling, who refused to give her up. The end of the matter does not appear.—P. C. R.
Birrel notes, under 14th August 1595, how Christian Johnston, a widow, was carried off from Edinburgh by Patrick Aikenhead. ‘The town was put in ane great fray by the ringing of the common bell,’ and ‘the said Christian was followit and brought back.’ On the 27th of November 1600, a number of persons were denounced and intercommuned for taking away the daughter of George Carkettle, burgess of Edinburgh, ‘furth of his awn house of Monkrig, where she was for the time [living] with her mother in peaceable and quiet manner.’ It afterwards appeared that the chief guilty party was Robert Hepburn of Alderston, in East Lothian.—P. C. R.
1591.
About two miles to the south-west of Edinburgh, on the slope of the Craig-Lockhart Hill, there is a mansion called Craig House of the period of James VI., and which in that time belonged to a branch of the old family of Kincaid. On the 17th of December 1600, John Kincaid of Craig House, attended by a party of friends and servants, all ‘bodin in feir of weir, with swords, secrets, and other weapons,’ came to the village of Water of Leith, also closely adjacent to Edinburgh, and there attacked the house of Bailie John Johnston, ‘where Isobel Hutcheon, widow, was in sober, quiet, and peaceable manner for the time, dreading nae evil, harm, injury, or pursuit of ony persons, but to have lived under God’s peace and our sovereign lord’s.’ Kincaid ‘violently and forcibly brak up the doors of the said dwelling-house, entered therein, and pat violent hands on the said Isobel’s person, took her captive, reft, ravished, and took her away with him to his place of Craig House; where he deteined her, while [till] his majesty being upon the fields, accompanied with John, Earl of Mar, Sir John Ramsay, and divers others, hearing of the committing of sic ane horrible fact, directed the said John, Earl of Mar, Sir John Ramsay, and divers others his hieness’ servants, to follow him, and relieve her furth of his hands. Wha having come to his place of Craig House, and requiring for her relief, he refusit to grant the same, while [till] they menaced to bring his majesty about his said house and raise fire therein; and sae compellit him to relieve her.’
Kincaid underwent trial for this outrage, January 13, 1601, and his doom was ordered by the king to be a fine of 2500 merks, payable ‘to us and our treasurer’—‘as also he sall deliver to us and our treasurer his brown horse.’—Pit.
Apr. 30.
‘John Dickson, younger of Belchester, being apprehended, ta’en, and brought to Edinburgh, was put to the knawledge of ane assize for the slaughter of his awn natural father [in July 1588], and also for the lying for the said offence at the process of excommunication. [Being convicted, he was] brought to the scaffold, and at the Cross broken on ane rack, [and] worried—where he lay all that night, and on the morn [was] carried to the gallows of the Burgh-moor, where the rack was set up, and the corpse laid thereupon.’—Jo. Hist.
June 6.
In the midst of the proceedings regarding the witches, two ministers of Edinburgh broke out against the king in their sermons for his feeble administration of justice. One spoke of the universal contempt of his subjects; the other said he did not seem to have any power over even a witch-wife, meaning Barbara Napier. James sent for them two days after, at the Tolbooth, where he often sat beside the judges of the session. He remonstrated with them for the freedom they had used, but could not bring them to acknowledge any fault. In the conversation which ensued, they argued with the king about their respective powers. An apostle said: ‘We shall judge the angels;’ and Christ had said: ‘Ye shall sit upon twelve thrones and judge.’ Here was sufficient warrant for the parish ministers of Scotland lording it over the head of the state. After all, they protested they loved him, and he parted with them in good-humour.
1591.
On the ensuing 8th of December, a highly characteristic scene took place at Holyrood—three of the ministers ‘visiting’ the royal family as censors, ‘to try what negligence was in pastors, and abuses in the family.’ They went again upon Friday the 10th, when the king himself was present. They urged the king to have the Scriptures read at dinner and supper, and ‘willed that new elders could be chosen and the comptroller left out.’ A week after, one of them, Mr John Davidson, called in a private capacity at the palace to admonish the king about his failures in the exercise of king-craft, particularly in appointing bad men to offices, and pardoning great criminals. ‘The king answered, he found not concurrence in inferior magistrates ... there were diverse officers claimed their places by heritage. As for known pardons, he would answer for every one he gave by law and reason. As for unknown, such was the multitude of his businesses, that some about him deceived him by importunity, and got stolen subscriptions, from which kind of dealing he thought no flesh in his place could always be free. Further, he saw not where to make choice of fit officers, for when any man’s particular cometh in question, then their partiality may be seen.’—Cal.
1591. Oct. 28.
On this day are entered in the records of the Privy Council two complaints which illustrate in a remarkable manner the state of society at that time. First, James Lord Ogilvie of Airly, ancestor of the Earls of Airly, complains that, while he was living quietly in the protection of the law, and dreading harm from no man, the Earl of Argyle, without any provocation from him, hounded out a set of broken Highlandmen to the number of about five hundred, to attack him, and spoil his lands. He had ‘retired in sober and quiet manner, to dwell and make his residence in Glen Isla,’ when, on the 21st of August, they entered the district under silence of night, ‘with sic force and violence, that the said lord, lying far from his friends, was not able to resist them, but with great difficulty and short advertisement, he, his wife and bairns, escaped.’ The invading party are described as having slain all the people they could lay their hands on, eighteen or twenty in number; besides, they ‘spulyit and away-took ane grit number of nolt, sheep, and plenishing [furniture], to the utter wreck and undoing of the haill poor inhabitants of the country.’ Having at the command of the king retired, they still hovered on the neighbouring hills, and some weeks after made a new attack upon Glen Isla, as well as Glen Clova, slaying three or four persons, and taking away much spoil; ‘sae that the poor men dwelling in Glen Clova, Glen Isla, and other parts adjacent to the Month, wha are not able to make resistance, are sae oppressed by the broken men and sorners hounded out by the Earl of Argyle and his friends, and maintainit and reset by them, that neither by his majesty’s protection, nor assurance of the party, can their lives and gudes be in surety.’
This seems very mysterious, till we read the second entry, which is a complaint that, on the 16th of August bypast (five days previous to the above incident), Leighton of Usan and sundry of the Ogilvies, to the number of about threescore persons, had, at the instigation of Lord Ogilvie, gone with jacks, spears, harquebuses, and other weapons, and attacked Robert Campbell in Millhorn, William of Soutarhouse, Thomas Campbell of Keithock, and John Campbell of Muirton, whom they had mercilessly slain. How this outrage had been provoked, does not appear; but there can be no doubt that the invasion of Lord Ogilvie’s privacy in Glen Isla was a consequence of this earlier and similar incident.
The frightful cutaneous disease of leprosy prevailed in Scotland, as in most other European countries, from an early age. There was a hospital for the reception of its victims at Kingcase, near Ayr, believed to have existed from the reign of King Robert I. At Glasgow, such an establishment was planted by the Lady of Lochow, daughter of Robert, Duke of Albany, and in 1584 it had six inmates. In a solitary spot between Old and New Aberdeen, there was a leper-house, but rather poorly endowed, for in this year King James is found granting the inmates a right to one peat out of every load of peats sold in the town, in consideration that their rents were ‘unable to sustene them in meat and fire, wherethrough they live very miserably.’[184] There were a few other such refuges of hopeless misery throughout the land.
1591. Nov. 21.
In a sheltered spot called Greenside, near the northern skirts of the Calton Hill, a small monastery of Carmelite Friars had had a brief existence before the Reformation. On its desolate site, a merchant-burgess of Edinburgh, John Robertson by name (whom we soon after find in the office of bailie), now erected a small house for the reception of lepers, led thereto, it is stated, by a sense of gratitude to God for a signal deliverance vouchsafed to him. The town-council concurred in his object, and undertook the oversight and direction of the establishment. A committee of their number, in conjunction with a minister of the city, and John Robertson himself, drew up rules for the house, and arranged the means of its support. Five men afflicted with leprosy, and two women, the wives of two of these men, but not themselves lepers, were admitted, each leper being allowed four shillings Scots money—equal to 4d. sterling—weekly, and also having a privilege of begging under certain restrictions. They were on no account to go about for alms, or to stir from the house at all, or to admit any visitor, under penalty of death, and, to shew how earnest was the spirit of this rule, a gibbet was erected at the gable of the hospital, ready for the instant execution of any transgressor. From sunset to sunrise, their door was to be kept fast locked, under the same penalty. Each patient was to take his turn of sitting at the door ‘with ane clapper,’ to attract the attention of people passing between Edinburgh and Leith, and to beg from them for the general benefit. The rest were meanwhile to stay within doors. The two wives, Isobel Barear and Jonet Gatt, were to be allowed to go to market, to purchase vivres for the lepers and for themselves, but not to call anywhere else in town, under penalty of death. A person was appointed to read prayers to the inmates each Sunday, and a weekly oversight was confided to the Masters of Trinity Hospital. It serves curiously to realise the whole arrangement to our minds, that this hospital still exists, though the leper-house seems to have been extinct since the middle of the seventeenth century.[185]
1591. Dec. 10.
We have under this date a curious specimen of the administration of justice under King James. Letters are raised at the instance of ‘Helen Henderson, spouse of William Murray elder of Romanno; Margaret Tweedie, spouse of John Murray younger of Romanno; and —— Nisbet, spouse of William Murray, third Laird of Romanno, with the puir tenants, cotters, and labourers of the ground of the lands of Romanno, lying within the sheriffdom of Peebles:’ stating that these three lairds, with sundry other persons, had been denounced at the horn for their concern in the slaughter of John Hamilton of Coitquott[186] and his son; and, on the complaint of the widow and children of the said John, with a false report that the Lairds of Romanno were fortifying their tower of Romanno, there to defend themselves against the powers of the law, ‘his majesty appointit the same to be keepit by four persons, allowing them monthly the sum of twenty merks ... to be payit out of the living of Romanno,’ and caused letters to be directed to the complainers, charging them with this payment. The three ladies appeal against this order, on the ground that they had not been previously heard in their own cause. Had they been so, they could have shewn reasons to the contrary—‘the house of Romanno was never keepit agains his hieness, but the same, as alsae the country, is left by the said rebels, and that immediately after committing the fact (gif in their awn defence and by procurement of other persons God knaws and time will try), and therefore needit nae sic keepers, it being bot ane auld and ruinous touir, not meet for nae man to keep or hazard his life into, and, besides this, the said Helen Henderson, Margaret Tweedie, and —— Nisbet, are infeft in conjunct fee and liferent in the haill lands of Romanno, whilk is bot a puir ten-pund land, in effect barren of the self, and subject to the incursion and stouthreif of the broken men and thieves of baith the borders, and, as is mair nor notour, will not sustene the said complenars nor their families, they having nae manner of thing else whereupon to live.’ The ladies further pointed out the hardship of punishing the innocent for the guilty, and pleaded how they had already made a great composition with the representatives of the slaughtered persons. Nevertheless, on parties being heard before the Council, the letters complained of were found to be legal and proper, and so the garrison imposed on the old tower would remain for the meantime a burden on the estate.—P. C. R.
On the ensuing 17th of March, Jonas Hamilton of Coitquott gave surety by sundry of his friends, under large sums, that ‘Margaret Tweedie, relict of John Murray of Romanno, her tenants and servants, sall be harmless and skaithless.’
1591.
The garrison consisted of this Jonas; William, his brother; William Hamilton in Cranston; and William Brown in Bordland. It appears that the Murrays had held the house in contempt of a summons from John Blainslie, ‘Bute pursuivant,’ and had been thrust out with their families by force. The widow Margaret, with feminine tenacity of purpose, obtained a letter under the king’s signet for dispossessing the Hamilton garrison; and now this was reclaimed against. Parties being heard in presence, his majesty affirmed the order for the surrender of the house to the widow, on condition that she should give security that it should not prove a refuge for her outlawed relatives.—P. C. R.
Dec. 22.
During this troublous period of the king’s reign, the book of the Privy Council becomes a kind of review of the nobility and gentry of Scotland, as they severally appear to give caution for one another as to the maintenance of the peace, or are cited or denounced for its infraction. As an example of a kind of entry which occurs several times at every meeting, John Murray of Blackbarony becomes ‘actit and obleist as cautioner or surety for William Burnett of the Barns [both in Peeblesshire], that he sall compeir personally before the king’s majesty and Lords of Secret Council, at Halyrudhouse, or where it sall happen to be for the time, the 29 day of December instant, and answer to sic things as sall be inquirit of him, touching sic deidly feid as he has interest in, and that he sall underly sic order as his hieness and the said lords sall demene to him thereanent, under the pain of ane thousand merks.’—P. C. R.
The Earl of Bothwell seems to have been little distressed by his forfeiture. According to his own ideas, he was only suffering from the malice of a successful enemy, the Chancellor Maitland. All that he aimed at was a change of administration in his own favour. How to bring it about? In our days, such a discharged favourite would bide his time, in hopes that some new turn of affairs or a gust of popular favour through the House of Commons would bring him into favour again. In Scotland, at the close of the sixteenth century, the needful first step was to obtain, by whatever means, possession of the king’s person. Now then commenced a series of remarkable assaults on King James by his turbulent cousin.
1591. Dec. 27.
Having secured some favour among the royal attendants, he came to Holyroodhouse at night, with his friends the Lairds of Spott and Nisbet, Mr Archibald Douglas, a natural son of the Regent Morton, Mr John Colville, and others, to the amount of forty or fifty. They ‘enterit in at a stable-door beside the east gable of the Traitor’s Tower, whilk was called the Duke’s Stable, within the whilk there was a trap and ane entress privily made. Having enterit therein, they first bereft the porter of the keys, and then passed to the chancellor’s chalmer-door; they dang up the same. He, being foreseen by the cry of ane boy that there was ane tumult of men in the close, withdrew himself and some others within his inner chalmer, whilk has ane narrow entress, at whilk the conspirators strake with fore-hammers and shot pistolets. There was some shots of muskets shot out again [by which] some of them were hurt; [so they] for fear to be trappit, passed to the queen’s chalmer-door, whilk they brak up.’
‘In the meantime, the haill noblemen and gentlemen of his majesty’s house raise, who thought to have taken the Earl Bothwell and his complices. The earl fled; yet he returned at the south side of the abbey, where the said earl and his complices slew his majesty’s master-stabler, named William Shaw, and ane with him, named Mr Peter Shaw. But the king’s folk took eight of Bothwell’s faction, and on the morrow hanged them all without ane assize, betwixt the Girth Cross and the Abbey-gate.’—Moy. Bir.
Dec. 28.
‘The king’s majesty came to Sanct Geill’s Kirk, and there made ane oration anent the fray made by Bothwell and William Shaw’s slaughter, his master-stabler.’—Bir.
1591-2. Feb. 7.
The slaughter of the Bonny Earl of Moray at Dunnibrissle stands prominent amongst the tragic events of the time. It was much more a piece of clan warfare than is generally allowed by Scottish historians. Moray had connected himself with a number of gentlemen and heads of clans in the north, who had combined against the Earl of Huntly. In the latter part of 1590, there were in that district of Scotland musterings, marchings, and fightings, too obscure to make an appearance in general history, but enough to keep three counties in a state resembling civil war. Huntly, who acted as lord-lieutenant of the north, and thus had a colour of law on his side, pursued the Mackintoshes and Grants, who befriended the Earl of Moray, as rebels, both against himself, who was their feudal superior, and against the king. In a reconnoitring expedition which he made at Darnaway Castle, the Earl of Moray’s house, one of his gentlemen was unfortunately killed by a musket-shot, discharged by a servant from the battlements—an injury which the feelings of the day made it a virtue to revenge.
By the intervention of Lord Ochiltree, Moray came south to his house of Dunnibrissle, in Fife, with a view to a reconciliation with Huntly. The northern chief was also at court; but his thoughts were not turned on peace. In consequence of Moray having befriended the turbulent Bothwell, the king and Chancellor Maitland were wrought upon to grant a commission to Huntly for the capture of that nobleman, not dreaming, as we may charitably hope, of the cruel tragedy which was to ensue. Perhaps neither did Huntly meditate anything beyond taking Moray, and having him subjected to trial.
Mustering forty friends on horseback, he set out with them, as to a race at Leith; but, having thus lulled suspicion, he quickly turned away, and crossed the Forth at the Queensferry. At a late hour on a winter night, the Earl of Moray heard his lonely house surrounded by the hostile Gordons, and received a summons to surrender. He had no friend with him but one—Dunbar, sheriff of Moray—and a few servants; yet he determined to make resistance. The Gordons then gathered corn from the neighbouring farms, and piling it against the door, set it on fire. To pursue the quaint recitals of the day: ‘The Earl of Moray, being within, wissed not whether to come out and be slain, or be burned quick; yet, after avisement, this Dunbar says to my Lord of Moray: “I will go out at the gate before your lordship, and I am sure the people will charge on me, thinking me to be your lordship; sae, it being mirk under night, ye shall come out after me, and look if that ye can fend [provide] for yourself.” In the meantime, this Dunbar came forth, and ran desperately amang the Earl of Huntly’s folks, and they all ran upon him and presently slew him. During this broil with Dunbar, the Earl of Moray came running out at the gate of Dunnibrissle, which stands beside the sea, and there sat down amang the rocks. But, unfortunately, the said lord’s knapscull tippet, whereon was a silk string, had taken fire, which betrayed him to his enemies in the darkness of the night, himself not knowing the same. They came down on him on a sudden, and there most cruelly, without mercy, murdered him.’—Bir. Moy.
1591-2.
Next morning, Edinburgh was full of mourning and lamentation for this sad event. That the victim was a Protestant and son-in-law of the Good Regent, while the Earl of Huntly was notedly the head of the popish party in Scotland, was chiefly remembered by them. The conflict of interests in the north, the death of John Gordon at Darnaway, and the possibility of Huntly having been far from meditating slaughter, were little known or reflected on. The sympathies of the king, on the other hand, were with Huntly; nor, had it been otherwise, would his majesty have found it an easy task to bring to justice a grandee who had recently come forth against the Protestant interest with ten thousand men at his back.
‘The king went forth to the hunting that morning; and hunting about Inverleith and Wardie, he saw the fire, which had not yet died out; but nothing moved with the matter.’—Cal. It was generally believed that both he and the Chancellor Maitland had not been unwilling that Huntly should do this deed. ‘The king sent for five or six of the ministers, made an harangue to them, wherein he did what he could to clear himself, and desired them to clear his part before the people. They desired him to clear himself with earnest pursuing of Huntly with fire and sword. The king alleged his part to be like David’s when Abner was slain by Joab.’—Cal. It nevertheless appears, from the records of Privy Council, that James, on the 8th of February, being the day after the murder, retracted from Huntly his commission of lieutenancy.
Feb. 9.
‘—— the Earl of Moray’s mother, accompanied with her friends, brought over her son’s and the sheriff of Moray’s dead corpse, in litters, to Leith, to be brought from thence to be buried in the aile of the Great Kirk of Edinburgh, in the Good Regent’s tomb, and, as some report, to be made first a spectacle to the people at the Cross of Edinburgh; but they were stayed by command from the king. Captain [John] Gordon laine cloth, with lamentations, and earnest suit for justice. But little regard was had to the matter. Of the three bullets she found in the bowelling of the body of her son, she presented one to the king, another to ..., the third she reserved to herself, and said: “I sall not part with this till it be bestowed on him that hindereth justice.”‘[187]—Cal.
1591-2.
One of the king’s friends, Lord Spynie, hearing that Captain Gordon had been brought to Leith, got a warrant from the king to bring him to Edinburgh Castle, ‘to have eschewit the present trial of law;’ but Lord Ochiltree, being informed of this, took horse with about forty friends and servants in arms, and went forth after the king, who, even at this dismal moment, could not restrain his inordinate propensity to hunting. Lord Ochiltree ‘came upon the king on the north side of Corstorphine Craigs, where his majesty was taking a drink. [He] lichtit and stayit his horse at the hill foot, and came to his majesty and show[ed] him ... how far this murder touched his highness, whereof he besought him maist humbly to consider.... Upon Lord Ochiltree his earnest desire, his majesty granted him a warrant to present Captain Gordon and his man to the trial of ane assize that same day; whilk with all diligence the said lord did perform, and the said captain was beheadit, and his man hanged. The captain condemned the fact, protesting that he was brought ignorantly upon it.’—Moy. Cal.
The Earl of Huntly made an appearance of satisfying the demands of law for the slaughter of Moray, by entering himself in ward in Blackness Castle, as preliminary to his trial; but the king released him after eight days’ confinement, and he was not again troubled on that score. It is to be observed, however, that the Bonny Earl’s death did not pass without at least an attempt at revenge in the north.
The Clan Chattan or Mackintoshes, and the Grants, were much incensed by the fact, and made great ‘stirs’ against their superior the Earl of Huntly. The earl sent the Clan Cameron against the one, and a leader called Mackranald against the other, and had great slaughter committed upon both. The Mackintoshes, still indisposed to submit, came in the fall of the year 1592, eight hundred strong, into the Gordon territories of Strathdee and Glenmuick, where they killed four gentlemen of Huntly’s vassalage. One of these was the Laird of Brackla, a place near the modern watering-village of Ballater. He was an old man, much given to hospitality, and had received a party of these invaders without any apprehension of their hostile intentions. After a kindly entertainment, they killed the old man in his own hall (November 1)—a circumstance which naturally added much bitterness to the feelings of his friends, as it was considered as the foulest style in which murder could be committed.[188]
1591-2.
The Earl of Huntly was interrupted in an invasion of the Mackintosh estate of Pettie in Inverness-shire, by a report of what was going on in Aberdeenshire. With his uncle, Sir Patrick Gordon of Auchindoun, and about thirty-six horsemen, he did not hesitate immediately to ride into Strathdee and attack the Mackintoshes, now passing over a hill called Stapliegate in the Cabrach. After a sharp skirmish, he routed them utterly, killing about sixty. He then caused parties of his people to invade and spoil the Mackintosh and Grant territories; nor did he rest till, by slaughter and pillage, he had completely reduced these clans to his obedience.[189]—G. H. S.
1591-2.
It is not unworthy of remark, that the Privy Council Record contains no notice of these outrages in the north, beyond an entry dated November 9, 1592, adverting to ‘great cruelties, herships, and disorders recently committit by the lawless broken Highlandmen of the Clan Chattan, Clan Cameron, Clanranald, and others pretending their dependence on the Earls of Huntly and Athole;’ which had ‘sae wrackit and shaken louss sundry parts of the north country, that great numbers of honest and peaceable folks are murtherit, their houses burnt now in the winter season, their guids spulyit, disponit, and exponit in prey, in far greater rigour nor it was with foreign enemies;’ for which reasons a commission was granted to the Earl of Angus to go north and deal with the said earls for the pacification of the country, and, failing this, to raise the well-affected people in arms, and put down the lawless by force. This view of the matter is so inconsistent with the statement of Sir Robert Gordon, above quoted, as to suggest that the Scottish government knew hardly anything of the relations of parties, and had heard only of there being troubles in a certain district. No notice whatever is taken of the sweeping vengeance executed by the Earl of Huntly upon the Mackintoshes and Grants. Certainly, no feature of the time is more remarkable than this freedom and power of the great nobles to do what they considered justice upon their enemies, while the king was unable by any force under his own immediate control to protect himself in his own palace.
We learn from another source, that the Earl of Angus brought matters to a bearing in conformity with the king’s direction, by causing ‘baith the parties subscryve ane assurance, bot of their awn form.’—Moy.
Feb. 28.
Richard Graham had for some years been noted as a prominent licentiate of the devil’s medical college. He professed to despise common witchcraft as a vulgar thing, and would only admit that he consulted spirits. Spottiswoode, speaking of the death of the good Earl of Angus, says: ‘In the time of his sickness, when the physicians found his disease not to proceed of any natural cause [it was concluded to be by enchantment], one Richard Graham being brought to give his opinion of it, made offer to cure him, saying, as the manner of these wizards is, “that he had received wrong.” But when he [the earl] heard that the man was suspected to use unlawful arts, he would by no means admit him, saying: “That his life was not so dear to him, as, for the continuance of it some years, he would be beholden to any of the devil’s instruments; that he held his life of God, and was willing to render the same at His good pleasure, knowing he should change it for a better.”‘[190]
1591-2.
It is related that Sir Lewis Bellenden, Lord Justice-clerk, dealt with Graham to raise the devil. Graham having raised him in Sir Lewis’s own yard in the Canongate, ‘he [Sir Lewis] was thereby so terrified that he took sickness and thereof died.’—Stag. State.
It was satisfactorily made out that Graham had been the adviser of the witch Barbara Napier and her associates; and we have just seen that the Earl of Bothwell was likewise believed to have consulted him regarding the king’s death. This wizard, therefore—‘notour and knawn necromancer, ane common abuser of the people’—was apprehended; and on the day noted in the margin, he was ‘worried and burnt at the Cross of Edinburgh.’ According to Calderwood, ‘he stood hard to his former confession touching Bothwell’s practice against the king; that Arran, Lord Fairnyear,[191] was an enchanter; that the devil was raised at the Laird of Auchinleck’s dwelling-place, and in Sir Lewis Bellenden the Justice-clerk’s yard. The bruit [rumour] went that the chancellor [Maitland] had some tables and images about his neck, and that he was sure [safe] so long as he used them so; but Richard Graham deponed no such matter.’
Mar. 7.
The presbytery of Edinburgh laboured hard to get the Earl of Huntly and his friends excommunicated. They could not be brought to see that there was any need for the same severity against the Earl of Bothwell and his associates, who had tried to seize the king in his palace by night. James ‘grudged’ at this, ‘and said it would not be weel till noblemen and gentlemen got licence to break ministers’ heads.’—Cal.
1592. Mar. 31.
We have at this date a peculiar proceeding recorded, regarding a dyvour or bankrupt. ‘In presence of the provost, bailies, council, and community of the burgh of Edinburgh, Patrick Lindsay, tailor, was sworn in judgment that he was not worth five ...., sworn in judgment, divour and bare man. This was because he was reteinit in ward at the instance of John Anderson, burgess of the said burgh, for the sum of eighty pounds, by the space of sax ouks. After[wards], he was brought to the Cross, convoyit with the provost, bailies, and officers; and thereupon, after three Oyez’es, the said aith was published by Bartilmo Uchiltree, officer, wha cut the said Patrick’s belt in three pieces in presence of the haill people. This form of law was never practised in Edinburgh on the first erection thereof, and therefore I thought necessary to put [it] in memory.’—Jo. Hist.
June (?)
1592.
‘There came from Aberdeen a young woman, called Helen Guthry, daughter to John Guthry, saddler, to admonish the king of his duty. She was so disquieted with the sins reigning in the country—swearing, filthy speaking, profanation of the Sabbath, &c.—that she could find no rest till she came to the king. She presented a letter to him when he was going to see his hounds. After he had read a little of it, he fell a laughing that he could scarce stand on his feet, and swore so horribly that the woman could not spare to reprove him. He asked if she was a prophetess. She answered she was a poor simple servant of God, that prayed to make him a servant of God also; that was desirous vice should be punished, and specially murder, which was chiefly craved at his hands; that she could find no rest till she put him in mind of his duty. After the king and courtiers had stormed a while, she was sent to the queen, whom she found more courteous and humane. So great and many were the enormities in the country, through impunity and want of justice, that the minds of simple and poor young women were disquieted, as ye may see; but the king and court had deaf ears to the crying sins.’—Cal.
June 28.
Half a year had now elapsed since Bothwell’s fruitless attempt on Holyroodhouse. The king was living his usual free-and-easy life in his little hunting-seat or palace of Falkland in Fife, when the forfeited lord thought proper to make a new attempt in his peculiar style at a change of administration, or restoration of himself to power and favour. A little after midnight, he suddenly appeared before the royal residence with three hundred men, and tried, but in vain, to obtain entrance. James had been forewarned; and, throwing himself into the tower of the palace, which he had had time to furnish with provisions, he set the assailants at defiance. Bothwell, baffled, and fearing to meet the friends who he knew would speedily rally to the king’s assistance, left the place at seven in the morning, carrying off all the horses, in order to check pursuit.
‘Thereafter his majesty came over the water, and made ane oration in the Great Kirk of Edinburgh. Immediately after the fray, Bothwell and his men came over the water, and there were eighteen of them taken in Calder Muir, and in other parts near Calder Muir, lying sleeping for want of rest and enterteenment; and, immediately after their taking, they were all brought to Edinburgh, and [five of them] hangit.
1592.
‘At the same time [July 1] the Lairds of Niddry and Samuelston [friends of Bothwell][192] were taken by Lord John Hamilton [lying sleeping in the meadow of Lesmahago], and warded in the Castle of Draphane.... Lord Hamilton] came to Edinburgh, thinking to have got grace to them from his majesty. He came down to his majesty’s lodgings at the Nether Bow, and going into Mr John Laing’s house, where his majesty lodgit, the guard standing above the [Nether Bow] port, with their hagbuts, guns, and other weapons ... seeing my Lord Hamilton, for the honour of his lordship, shot ane volley at my lord. There was ane man [James Sinclair of Earstone] speaking to his lordship, shot through the head; ane other by him shot through the leg; and ane bullet struck the lintel of the gate just above my lord’s head where he stood, yet no more harm done. So that, by mere accident, the said Lord Hamilton had [al]most have been slain, and not through any evil will.
‘The Lord Hamilton, seeing he could get no grace to the said two gentlemen, sent word to his bastard son Sir John, who convoyit the said two gentlemen away, and went with them himself for their more safety.’—Bir.
Early in August, a plan was devised by two courtiers, Wemyss of Logie and the Laird of Burleigh, to bring Bothwell privately into the royal presence at Dalkeith Castle. On this occasion also, the king was forewarned, and Bothwell had to retire without being introduced. Burleigh confessed his fault; but Logie either stood out, or at the utmost admitted that he engaged in the plot for a good end, desiring to learn what was the purpose of the enemy. ‘The king said: “That was too much, not making him privy.” Logie said: “God forbid I should have told you anything, who can keep nothing close!” The king regretted to the queen that he had none about him who were sure.’—Cal. Logie was put into confinement.
‘Because the event of this matter had sic a success, it sall also be praised by my pen, as a worthy turn, proceeding from honesty, chaste love and charity, whilk should on nae ways be obscurit from the posterity for the guid example: and therefore I have thought guid to insert the same for a perpetual memory.
1592.
‘Queen Anne, our noble princess, was served with divers gentlewomen of her awn country, and namely with ane called Mrs Margaret Twinstoun, to whom this gentleman, Wemyss of Logie, bure great honest affection, tending to the godly band of marriage; the whilk was honestly requited by the said gentlewoman, yea even in his greatest mister [trouble]. For, howsoon she understood the said gentleman to be in distress, and apparently by his confession to be punished to the death; and she, having privilege to lie in the queen’s chalmer, that same very night of his accusation, where the king was also reposing that same night, she came furth of the door privily, baith the princes being then at quiet rest, and passed to the chalmer where the said gentleman was put in custody to certain of the guard, and commanded them that immediately he should be brought to the king and queen; whereunto they giving sure credence, obeyed. But howsoon she was come back to the chalmer door, she desired the watches to stay till he should come forth again; and so she closed the door, and convoyed the gentleman to a window, where she ministrat a lang cord unto him to convoy himself down upon; and sae by her guid charitable help he happily escaped by the subtlety of love.’—H. K. J.
‘Logie married the gentlewoman after, when he was received into the king’s favour again.’—Cal.
This incident has been made the subject of a popular ballad.
Aug. (?)
1592.
About this time, Bothwell was understood to be retired to his great estate in Liddesdale, and to be there engaged in a kind of work which is usually the privilege of royalty. ‘His majesty was informed that Bothwell had ane that cunyied false cunyie in the house of Row in Liddesdale.... His majesty wrate to the Lord Ochiltree, desiring him to go to the said house, and to bring sic men to his majesty as he fand there, together with all sic instruments as could be there had for cunying, with power to raise the haill country if need were.... The Lord Ochiltree gathered to the number of seven or aucht score horse, all in armour, and rade first to Jedburgh, where they stayit that night, and refreshit himself and his company; and Ferniehirst, his brother-in-law, sent with him three score horse upon the morn at night. [They] rade to the house of the Row at Liddesdale, and there took the twa men out of the house beside the tower, and thereafter strake up the doors of the tower, and brought the irons that prentit the cunyie, with all the instruments, together with ane number of thirty-shilling [half-crown] pieces, whilk were cunyied there, and delivered the same to his majesty in the Abbey. The false cunyier was gone in England, and was not to be had; to seek metal to cunyie more, as was reported.’—Moy.
On the high ground which skirts the Carse of Gowrie to the north, near the village of Rait, once stood a fortified house called Gaskenhall. Only a bit of broken garden-wall and a few trees now indicate the site. Here lived, at the end of the sixteenth century, Robert Bruce of Clackmannan, chief of the family which had given Scotland a king three centuries before, and described in the grave pages of Douglas’s Baronage as a most respectable person, ‘in high favour with King James VI., who conferred on him the honour of knighthood at the baptism of his son Prince Henry.’ Let us see, from the actual doings of this knight, what sort of person he was.
In August 1592, some goods belonging to Bruce, having to pass through Perth, were subjected to payment of custom by the magistrates, who, on payment being refused, seized them. Clackmannan sent a letter of remonstrance, threatening, if his goods were not restored, to make the Perth citizens suffer for it when they chanced to pass his house. This not being attended to, he attacked a party of citizens on their way from Dundee, and despoiled them of their weapons; for in those days a party of quiet burghers passing through twenty miles of even this central and comparatively civilised district of Scotland, could not go unarmed. The only reply the laird got to a message offering the weapons back in exchange for his goods, was a visit from a company of Perth citizens, who destroyed a good deal of his growing corn with their horses. He came out to remonstrate, and an altercation ensuing, he was provoked to strike one of the aggressors with a pistol. He then seized the two chief men of the party, William Inglis and John Balsillie, and took them as prisoners into his house of Gaskenhall.
That same night, a large party of the citizens of Perth, headed by the bailies and council, came out in arms to Gaskenhall, where, upon the morrow, before daylight, they sounded their drum, besieged the laird in his house, and discharged hagbuts and pistols in at the doors and windows, whereby a servant of his was wounded. At last setting fire to the house, they entered at the roof, set free their friends, and seized the laird, whom they ‘transportit away with them ane certain space, barefooted and barelegged, not suffering him to put on his awn claithes.’ They likewise ‘spulyit and took away with them his haill silver-wark, bedding, claithes, and all the plenishing of his house.’—P. C. R.
1592.
This affair came before the king, who seems to have taken no step in the case beyond declaring both parties in the wrong, and ordering the laird and the magistrates into divers prisons, there to lie at their own respective costs, until they should be subjected to an assize. A Perth chronicler states: ‘They were thereafter agreed upon the town’s large charges.’ The agreement, however, does not seem to have been effectual, for, on the 28th of April 1593, as John Wilson and John Niven, with other citizens of Perth, were passing the Coble of Rhynd on their way to the market of St Andrews, they were beset by the laird, accompanied with nine horsemen and footmen, all well armed. ‘The said John Wilson and John Niven, being baith hurt and wounded in divers parts of their bodies, to the effusion of their blood in great quantity, the said laird and his accomplices maist shamefully tirrit them baith naked, and in maist barbarous and shameful manner scourgit them with horse bridles through the town of Abernethy, as gif they had been thieves or heinous malefactors; [then] left the said John Niven lying there for dead, and took the said John Wilson, naked, as captive and prisoner away with them.’
On the complaint of the magistrates of Perth, among whom was the afterwards famous Earl of Gowrie, acting as provost, the Laird of Clackmannan was charged to appear before the king, on pain of being denounced as a rebel in case of failure.
Oct.
‘The ministry of Edinburgh devised twa purposes, which they had baith in head at a time; either thinking to prevail in ane or else in baith, as tending to the glory of God, as they pretended. The ane was to discharge the merchants of Edinburgh from haunting and resorting to Spain; the other was, that nae mercat-day should be halden in Edinburgh for selling of wool and sheep’s skins; whereat baith merchants and craftsmen were grieved.... The ministers at nae time proponit thir matters to be reasoned or disputed by the provost of the town and his council, to whom it specially apperteinit; but, as they did, thought it mair expedient to divulgate the matter openly in the kirk, in presence of the haill people, alleging that the merchants could not make voyage to Spain without danger of their sauls, and therefore willit them in the name of God to abstein.... At divers times this was openly required, while at last, finding that the merchants continued in their trade as before, they cried out that unless they wald forbear, they should expreme their names to the people, and therefore cited divers merchants before their session, and there commanded them to abstein. The merchants, seeing this, gave in their complaint to the king, and tauld how they were discharged [forbidden] by the ministers, but wald disobey thereunto, if his majesty wald grant them liberty to pass, whilk was granted; whereat the ministers were sae grieved, that they boasted [threatened] the merchants with excommunication. But the provost and council interceded, and stayed that purpose, because that to the merchants divers Spanyards were addebted, whilk wald never be repaid unless they went themselves to make count and reckoning with them; and siclike divers of them were awing to creditors there, and in that respect till their counts were perfyted and ended, they could not abstein from travelling.... Sae the ministers had patience for that time, otherwise this matter had turned to a great popular scism.
1592.
‘... the other conceit had almaist have made a worse end; because it was sae prejudicial to the commonwealth and estate of the haill merchants and craftsmen, to wit, the abolition of the Monday’s mercat, whilk was the only special mercat-day of all the week in respect of the rest. The reason that the ministers had for them was, that all men that came to the Monday’s mercat did address him to his journey on Sunday, whilk day sould be sanctified and keepit holy; but amang many great infallible reasons, it was funden that the maist part of the mercat folks did never address themselves to journey while Monday morning, and therefore the mercat should not cease; and as to these that came far off, it became the pastors of their parochin to hinder them. Besides all this, that mercat-day was authorised to the town by the princes of ancient time, and therefore it became not a subject to consent to the abolition thereof, unless the matter was moved in presence of the three estates of parliament.’—H. K. J. The people in general murmured at these interferences with their secular affairs, well meant as they undoubtedly were. Calderwood speaks bitterly of the satirical rhymes vented on the occasion against the clergy, adding: ‘Such has always been the religion of Edinburgh, when they are touched in their particular.’ At length, in April 1593, the affair of the market came to a head. ‘The shoemakers, who were most interested in that business, hearing that the same was to be put in execution, tumultuously gathering themselves together, came to the ministers’ houses, menacing to chase them furth of the town if they did urge that matter any more. After which the motion ceased, the market continuing as before. This did minister great occasions of sport at that time in court, where it was said, “that rascals and souters could obtain at the ministers’ hands what the king could not in matters more reasonable.”’—Spot.
Nov. 17.
‘Dame Margaret Douglas, sometime Countess of Bothwell, met the king at the Castle-yett of Edinburgh on her knees, having up her hood, crying for Christ’s sake that died on the cross, for mercy to her and her spouse, with mony tears piteous to behold. The king putting out his hand to have tane her up, she kissed the back of his hand thrice. Then he passed into the castle, and the lady came down the street. The same day, ere the king came out of the palace, the Lairds of Niddry and Samuelston, with sundry others forfaultit of before, came on their knees in the outward close of the palace, wha were received in favours.’—Jo. Hist.
Nov. 23.
‘Ane proclamation that no man shall receipt the Countess of Bothwell, give her entertainment, or have any commerce or society with her in any case, wha had been so lately received in his majesty’s favour before. Behold the changes of court!‘—Bir.
Dec. 25.
A few days before this date, the Earl of Mar was married at Alloa to Mary, the second daughter of the late Duke of Lennox and sister of the Countess of Huntly. The king honoured the marriage with his presence, and spent his Christmas with the newly wedded pair. It is rather surprising to find Mar, who had always been on the ultra-Protestant side, allying himself to a daughter of the papist Lennox; but tradition informs us that the god of love had in this case overcome that of politics—if there be such a deity. There were also some natural obstructions, for the earl was a widower of five-and-thirty, while the bride was little more than a girl. The story is, that his lordship, finding the young lady scornful, became low-spirited to such a degree as to alarm his old school-fellow, the king, for his life. Learning what was the matter, James told him in his characteristic familiar style: ‘By ——, ye shanna die, Jock,[193] for ony lass in a’ the land!’ He then used his influence as virtual guardian of the Lennox family, and soon brought about the match. From this pair have descended some of the most remarkable patriots, lawyers, statesmen, and divines, to which our country has given birth.[194]
1592.
In the midst of the festivities at Alloa, the king was unpleasantly disturbed by intelligence of the capture of George Ker, adverted to in the next article.
Dec. 27. 1592-3.
Jan. 9.
In the latter part of this year, the king was nearly on as bad terms with the clergy as ever. They openly reproached him in their pulpits with slackness of justice against the enemies of religion. One maintained that he might very properly be excommunicated, if he resisted their behests. The king told the provost to pull them out of their pulpits when they spoke so against him; but this the provost plainly said he could not do—he preferred God before men. Things were in this ticklish state when George Ker was taken with sundry letters from Catholics at home to Catholics abroad, and three blank letters from Huntly, Errol, and Angus, believed to be the foundation of a conspiracy with Spain against the Protestant religion. The brethren met in Mr Robert Bruce’s gallery to devise measures, and a huge deputation went down to Holyroodhouse, to confer with the king. He received them in the great hall, and was at first very angry with them for their thus meeting unauthorisedly, saying, ‘“he knew not of it till all the wives in the kail-mercat knew of it.” Yet in the end, to mitigate them in some measure, he said he liked weel their zeal, for he knew they did it for love of the good cause.’—Cal. So began a sort of civil war, which lasted two or three years, and ended in the banishment of the three Catholic nobles, as already related.
Mr Tytler attributes these new troubles to the persecuting spirit of the Presbyterian divines. ‘The principle of toleration,’ he says, ‘divine as it assuredly is in its origin, yet so late in its recognition even amongst the best men, was then utterly unknown to either party, Reformed or Catholic. The permission even of a single case of Catholic worship, however secret; the attendance of a solitary individual at a single mass, in the remotest district of the land, in the most secluded chamber, and where none could come but such as knelt before the altar for conscience’ sake, and in all sincerity of soul; such worship and its permission for an hour, was considered an open encouragement of Antichrist and idolatry. To extinguish the mass for ever, to compel its supporters to embrace what the kirk considered to be the purity of presbyterian truth, and this under the penalties of life and limb, or in its mildest form of treason, banishment and forfeiture, was considered not merely praiseworthy, but a high point of religious duty; and the whole apparatus of the kirk, the whole inquisitorial machinery of detection and persecution, was brought to bear upon the accomplishment of these great ends.’
The king, whether from his natural disposition, or views of policy, was averse to harassing the papists. He one day spoke privately to Lord Hamilton of his unhappy position. ‘“You see, my lord, how I am used, and have no man in whom I may trust more than in Huntly, &c. If I receive him, the ministers cry out that I am an apostate from the religion; if not, I am left desolate.” “If he and the rest be not enemies to the religion,” said the Lord Hamilton, “ye may receive them; otherwise not.” “I cannot tell,” saith the king, “what to make of that; but the ministry hold them for enemies. Always, I would think it good that they enjoyed liberty of conscience.” Then the Lord Hamilton crying aloud, said: “Sir, then we are all gone, then we are all gone, then we are all gone! If there were no moe to withstand, I will withstand.” When the king perceived his servants to approach, he smiled and said: “My lord, I did this to try your mind.”‘—Cal. Few things could better illustrate the sanctity in which the principle of intolerance was then held, than to find a contemporary historian relating this anecdote as one simply illustrative of the infirm adherence of King James to the presbyterian cause.
The Earl of Errol, one of the exiled Catholic lords, writing to the king from Middleburg in July 1596, speaks of having undergone incessant troubles ever since he professed the Catholic religion, and of having for three or four years past been in daily and extreme peril of his life. He says: ‘My late and greatest extremities have proceeded only upon that over-great fervour and onnecessar rigour of the ministry, wha, disdainfully rejecting all reasonable conditions, will force men’s consciences, not as yet persuaded, till embrace their opinions in matters of religion.’[195]
1592-3.
Mr John Graham of Hallyards, a judge of the Court of Session, had an unfortunate litigation with Sir James Sandilands, the Tutor of Calder, about some temple-lands which his wife had brought to him. There had been a deed forged in the case, and a notary hanged for it, and a collision between the Court of Session and the General Assembly as to jurisdiction, and now Sir James Sandilands had become incensed to a degree of fury against his opponent the judge.
Graham, being charged by the king, for peace’ sake, to depart from Edinburgh, was passing down Leith Wynd in obedience to the order, attended by three or four score persons for his protection, when Sir James Sandilands, accompanied by his friend the Duke of Lennox, and an armed company, followed hard at his heels. Graham, thinking he was about to be attacked, turned to make resistance. The duke sent to tell him that if he proceeded on his journey, no one would molest him; but the message proved of no use, in consequence of some stray shot from Graham’s company. The party of Sandilands immediately made an attack; the other party hastily fled. Graham fell wounded on the street, and was carried into a neighbouring house. A French boy, page to Sir Alexander Stewart, one of Sandilands’s friends, seeing his master slain, followed the hapless judge into the house, ‘douped a whinger into him,’ and so despatched him. Such was the characteristic termination of a lawsuit in 1593.—Cal.
It is highly worthy of remark, that, not many months after, Sir James Sandilands was once more peaceably living at court.
1593.
Amongst the complications of the affair between Huntly and Moray in February 1592, there were mingled the details of a plot in which Huntly and the Chancellor Maitland were connected with three chieftains of the clan Campbell—Ardkinlas, Lochnell, and Glenurchy—against the life of John Campbell of Calder, who was obnoxious to the latter persons on account of his supreme influence in the affairs of the minor Earl of Argyle. By the exertions of Ardkinlas, a man called MacEllar was procured to undertake the assassination of Calder: and in the same month which saw the tragedy at Dunnibrissle, this wretched man shot Calder with three bullets, through a window, as the victim sat unsuspecting of danger in the house of Knepoch in Lorn.
1593.
The youthful earl having threatened vengeance against Ardkinlas, the latter seems to have lost heart; and being extremely desirous of recovering his young chief’s regard, he seriously made an endeavour to that effect by means of witchcraft, and was much disappointed when that resource failed him. He subsequently tried to accomplish his purpose by revealing what he knew of another plot in which the same parties were concerned against the earl’s life. This, however, is aside from our present subject. It may be sufficient to remark that MacEllar and a higher agent in the person of John Oig Campbell of Cabrachan, a brother of Lochnell, were taken and executed for Calder’s death; but owing to various causes, among which the complicity and friendship of Maitland was probably the chief, Ardkinlas continued for a considerable time to keep out of the grasp of the law.
Mar. 28.
At the time noted, he sustained an assault of private vengeance which might well make him tremble. A complaint which he entered before the Privy Council sets forth that, having occasion to be at Dumbarton with some friends, including Duncan Campbell, Dean of Brechin, on his way to Edinburgh, whither he was going in obedience to a summons of the king, ‘he took purpose to hald forward in his journey that same night after supper, by reason of the troubles whilk are in the country, lippening [trusting] for naething less than ony injury or trouble to have been intended him.’ Nevertheless, John Buchanan of Drumfoid, with a party of friends, and ‘sundry others, broken men and fugitives, to the number of twenty-four persons, on horse and foot, all bodin in feir of weir, with lang hagbuts, jacks, pistolets, and other weapons invasive,’ took up a position in a yard beside the road, with the design of murdering Campbell. ‘The said Duncan and ane other of his [Ardkinlas’s] servants, being ganging a little before him, and the persons foresaid surely believing that ane of them had been the Laird of Ardkinlas, they dischargit ane dozen of hagbuts at the said twa persons, and shot the said Duncan in the head; and thereafter, coming furth of the yard, finding the said Duncan not to be dead, and still believing he had been the said Laird of Ardkinlas, they shamefully and barbarously mangled and slew him with swords, and cuttit off his head. And then, perceiving themselves to be disappointed, they sharply followit the said laird, shot aucht or nine hagbuts at him, and had not failed likewise to have slain him, were not that by the providence of God he escaped.’
1593.
The next notice we have of affairs connected with the Campbell conspiracies is a curious, though obscure one, regarding what was in the language of that time called a Day of Law, held in Edinburgh on the 19th of June (the king’s birthday) 1593. There appeared as seekers of justice for Calder’s slaughter, the Earl of Argyle (seventeen years of age), the sheriff of Ayr, the Earl of Morton, and some others; as defenders in that cause, Ardkinlas, Glenurchy, and others. The Chancellor Maitland, whose concern was suspected, but did not become clear till our own time, had his friends assembled also—namely, the Earls of Montrose, Eglintoun, and Glencairn, and Lord Livingstone, ‘who all accompanied Lord Hamilton on the streets.’ Against them were mustered the Duke of Lennox, the Earl of Mar, Lord Home, and some others, who, favoured with the countenance of the queen, talked of bringing in Lord Quondam against the chancellor: by this name they indicated Captain James Stuart, long sunk out of credit and means, but still eager to take any desperate means of recovering his place. To this goodly company it was expected that Lord Maxwell and the Laird of Cessford would soon be added. The affair seemed so threatening, that the king was seriously alarmed, and commanded all to keep their lodgings; after which he ‘dealt with the chancellor to entreat them to depart in peace.’ Such was a day of law in the reign of gentle King James.
It was not till September 1596 that Ardkinlas underwent a trial for the slaughter of the Laird of Calder. The matter having doubtless been arranged beforehand, no pursuers appeared, and he was set at liberty.[196]
June 21.
George Smollett, burgess of Dumbarton (an ancestor of the novelist), was denounced rebel for not answering certain charges made against him by the burghs of Glasgow and Renfrew. It was alleged that Smollett, having purchased a letter of the king, used it as a sanction to deeds of violent oppression against the Highland people resorting with merchandise to those towns. ‘He not only masterfully reives the goods and bestial, claithing, and other wares, brought by the inhabitants of the Isles and other parts of the Highlands, to the said burghs, by sea and land, but takes, apprehends, and imprisons their persons, and sometimes pursues themselves by way of deid.’ It was added that the people of the Highlands were, in consequence, inspired with a deadly hatred of the burghs of Glasgow and Renfrew, and were already committing such reprisals as threatened civil war.—P. C. R.
1593. July 7.
An act of Privy Council, reciting that ‘vile murders have not only been committed within kirks and other places, but even within the burgh of Edinburgh and suburbs thereof, ewest [near] to his hieness’ palace, to the great hazard of his awn person,’ commands the authorities of the city, the king’s guard, the master and porter of his palace, to ‘search for all hagbuts and pistolets’ worn by any persons in the city and king’s palace, and convey the wearers to prison, the weapons to be escheat for the benefit of the apprehenders. In the parliament which sat down a few days afterwards, it was enacted: ‘Whaever sall happen, at ony time hereafter, to strike, hurt, or slay ony person within his hieness’ parliament-house during the time of the halding of the parliament; within the king’s inner chalmer, cabinet, or chalmer of presence, the king’s majesty for the time being within his palace; or within the Inner Tolbooth the time that the Lords of Session sit for administration of justice; or within the king’s privy council-house the time of the council sitting there; or whaever sall happen to strike, hurt, or slay ony person in the presence of his majesty, wherever his hieness sall happen to be for the time; sall incur the pain of treason.’ For those who commit the like offences in places and presences of less importance, severe penalties are denounced. Another act aimed at strengthening the hands of the magistrates of Edinburgh in their endeavours to apprehend turbulent persons and rebels, seeing that the weakness of such authorities ‘is the original and principal cause wherefra the great confusion and disorder of this land, in all estates, proceeds.’—S. A. and P. C. R.
July 22.
The feud between the Lord Maxwell and the Laird of Johnston, which had been stayed by a reconciliation, broke out again afresh in consequence of a foray by William Johnston of Wamphray, usually called, from his reckless, dissipated character, the Galliard, in the lands of the Crichtons of Sanquhar and Douglases of Drumlanrig. The Galliard being taken in the fray and hanged, his friends, on being pursued for the recovery of the stolen cattle, stood at bay and fought so desperately that many of their enemies bit the dust. A remarkable scene was consequently presented in Edinburgh. ‘There came certain poor women out of the south country, with fifteen bloody shirts, to compleen to the king that their husbands, sons, and servants, were cruelly murdered by the Laird of Johnston, themselves spoiled, and nothing left them. The poor women, seeing they could get no satisfaction, caused the bloody shirts to be carried by pioneers through the town of Edinburgh, upon Monday, the 23d of July. The people were much moved, and cried out for a vengeance upon the king and council. The king was nothing moved, but against the town of Edinburgh and the ministry. The court alleged they had procured that spectacle in contempt of the king.’—Cal.
July 24.
Bothwell had now been little heard of for upwards of a twelvemonth, a long interval of quietness for such a politician. The time had at length come for a third attempt to regain favour with the king. ‘At eight hours in the morning, the Earl of Bothwell, the Laird of Spott, Mr William Leslie, and Mr John Colville’ [‘to the number of twa or three hundred men’], ‘came into the king’s chalmer, weel provided with pistol. It was reported that the said Earl and Mr John were brought in by the Lady Athole, at the back yett of the abbey. This earl and his complices came not this way provided with pistols and drawn swords to harm the king’s majesty any ways, but because he could not get presence of his majesty, nor speech of him, for the Homes, who were courtiers with the king, and enemies to the said Earl of Bothwell. Sae they came into his majesty’s chalmer, resolving themselves not to be halden back till they should have spoken with him; and sae after they came in, his majesty was coming frae the back-stair, with his breeks in his hand, in ane fear—howbeit he needed not. The foresaid Bothwell and his complices fell upon their knees, and gave their swords upon the ground, and beggit mercy at his majesty; and his majesty being wise, merciful, a noble prince of great pity, not desirous of blood, granted them mercy, and received them in his favour; and at four hours afternoon proclaimed them his free lieges.’
‘There was ane great tumult in Edinburgh for this. They come all down in arms, and cried to understand the king’s mind, who cried out and said, that he was not captive, but weel, in case that whilk was promised by them should be keepit; and commanded them all to the abbey kirk-yard, to stay there till he called for them. Immediately thereafter, [he] sent for the provost and bailies, and commanded them to dissolve and go homeward; he houpit all should be weel.’—Moy. Bir.
1593.
For a time the Chancellor Maitland, Lord Home, and other courtiers gave way before the replaced Bothwell. The English ambassador exerted influence in his behalf. The zealous clergy befriended him, not for any virtues he could be said to possess, for he had none, but for that which was a compendium of all virtue, his professing to be for ‘the trew religion.’ King James was obliged to seem his friend, and to be quite against the Catholic lords. One day, as the king was travelling by Fala, near Soutra Hill, these nobles came up unexpectedly, threw themselves on their knees before him, and entreated forgiveness and favour. He told them he could do nothing for them unless they satisfied the kirk, and ‘he sent back, that same nicht, the Lord Treasurer and the Abbot of Lindores to the ambassador of England and the ministers of Edinburgh, desiring that they should conceive nae evil opinion of his part for their coming to him.’—H. K. J. Such were the relations of royalty to the priesthood in those days.
Dec. 11.
Notwithstanding such powerful support, Bothwell could not long maintain his place at court. We soon find him again at the horn, and passing through a rather picturesque adventure on a mountain-road a few miles to the south of Edinburgh. ‘It fortuned Sir Robert Kerr, younger of Cessford, accompanied only with one of his awn servants called Rutherford, to pass out of Edinburgh, homeward to his wife quietly; in the way of plain accident, [he] forgathered with the Earl Bothwell, and ane Gibson with him, beside Humbie on this side of Soutra Hill; where, meeting twa for twa, they fought a long time on horseback.... The Laird of Cessford’s man was hurt in the cheek, and at length baith the parties so wearied with long fechting, [that] they assented baith to let the others depart and ride away for that time. Cessford came back to Edinburgh, and tauld the king’s majesty of that accident.’—Moy.
1593. July 31.
Aberdeen, a commercial town with a university, bore a singular moral relation to the adjacent Highlands of the Dee, where a wild and lawless population, speaking a different language, and using a different dress, existed. Many were the troubles of the industrious burghers from these rude neighbours, who would sometimes come sweeping down upon their borders like a flight of locusts, and leave nothing of value uneaten or undestroyed. At this time, we find the council of the northern city meeting to consider ‘the barbarous cruelty lately exercit by the lawless hielandmen in Birse, Glentanner, and thereabout, not only in the unmerciful murdering of men and bairns, but in the masterful and violent spulying of all the bestial, guids, and gear of a great part of the inhabitants of these bounds ... committit near to this burgh, within twenty miles thereto;’ for which reason it was ordained that the whole inhabitants should be ready with arms to meet for the defence of the town, and to resist and repress the said hielandmen, as occasion shall be offered.’
The Crichtons and Douglases, whom the Johnstons had plundered in the summer of this year, having induced Lord Maxwell to take up their cause, and enter with them into bonds of manrent for mutual support, it behoved the Laird of Johnston to be stirring. To his aid came the reiving clans of Scott and Graham, and with them he fell upon and cut off a party of the Maxwells. This led to a decisive attempt of Lord Maxwell to bring the Johnstons to subjection; but, though undertaken under sanction of his office as warden of the west marches, it ended in a way very unfortunate for himself.
Dec. 6.
‘The Lord Maxwell, being on foot 1500 and horse together, coming to the Lochwood, having special commission of the king to have destroyed the said Lochwood, and banished and destroyed the haill Johnstons, because he [the laird] was ane favourer of the Earl Bothwell in some of his turns—being come over the Water of Annan—the Laird of Johnston, with the Scotts, to the number of 800 or thereby, ombeset the said lord in his way; where, without few or na strakes, the said lord was slain with the Laird Johnston’s awn hand [or, as is alleged, by Mr Gideon Murray, being servitor till Scott of Buccleuch[197]]; never ane of his awn folks remained with him (only twenty of his awn household), but all fled through the water; five of the said lord’s company slain; and his head and right arm were ta’en with them to the Lochwood, and affixed on the wall thereof. The bruit ran that the said Lord Maxwell was treacherously deserted by his awn company.’—Jo. Hist.
Such was the famous clan-battle of Dryfe’s Sands, the last of any note fought in the southern part of Scotland.
1593-4. Jan. 21.
For some time we have heard nothing of Eustachius Roche, quondam tacksman-general of the Scottish mines. From this circumstance, and the difficulties he seemed to be labouring under the last time we heard of him, it is little to be doubted that he had found his adventure unprofitable and hopeless, and given it up. Now another comes forward, one really notice-worthy, since he prospered to some extent in his undertaking, and laid the foundation of a property and a work which still exist. This was Thomas Foulis, goldsmith in Edinburgh.
The Edinburgh goldsmiths of that day, though only occupying a few small obscure shops stuck between the buttresses of St Giles’s Church, comprehended in their number two or three persons of such considerable wealth, as to verge upon a historic importance. Such, for example, was George Heriot, who in 1597 became goldsmith and jeweller to the king, and in time accumulated the fortune which enabled his executors to erect the magnificent hospital bearing his name. Another of the number was Thomas Foulis, who, when in spring 1593 the king had to march an army against the Papist lords in the north, supplied a great part of the funds required for the purpose. What the Bank of England has often in modern times been to the British government, Thomas Foulis, the Edinburgh goldsmith, was in those days to King James—a ready resource when money was urgently required for state purposes. On the 10th of September 1594, the royal debt to Thomas was no less than £14,598; and as a security so far for this sum, the king consigned to him ‘twa drinking pieces of gold, weighing in the haill fifteen pund and five unce,’ which the consignee was to be at liberty to coin into ‘five-pund pieces,’ if the debt should not be otherwise paid before the 1st of November next, ‘the superplus, gif oney beis,’ to be forthcoming for his majesty’s use. The value of the gold of these drinking-cups at the present day would be about £950, which shews that the debt in question was expressed in Scottish money. It may be remarked, that on the same day the king consigned another gold drinking-cup, weighing twelve pounds five ounces, in favour of John Arnott, burgess of Edinburgh, who had lent him £6000. It further appears that Thomas Foulis, very soon after, lent the king £12,000 more ‘for outredding of sundry his hieness’ affairs.’
1593-4.
In consideration of the loans he had had from Thomas Foulis, the king granted him (January 21, 1593-4), a lease of the gold, silver, and lead mines of Crawford Muir and Glengoner for twenty-one years. The Edinburgh tradesman probably had the sagacity to see, in a little time, that there was not, in those districts, a sufficiency of the more precious metals to pay the expense of collecting. We find, however, that in 1597 he was working the really valuable lead deposit of Lanarkshire, as there are acts of council in that year for the protection of his lead-carriers against ‘broken men of the borders.’[198]
We shall meet Thomas again. Meanwhile, it may be observed that his lead-mines in time passed through his granddaughter into the possession of (her husband) James Hope of Hopetoun, sixth son of the great lawyer, Sir Thomas, and the founder of the noble house of Hopetoun. It has long been one of the best estates in Scotland; and it is certainly curious to trace its origin to the hypocritical military expedition against the Catholic lords, into which King James was forced by his ultra-zealous Presbyterian subjects, when he would have much rather been ‘drinking and driving ower in the auld maner’ at home.
Whatever became of the gold-diggings in Foulis’s hands, we find that, before the expiration of the term of his lease, they were actively worked by another person. An Englishman named Bulmer, with the licence and favour of Queen Elizabeth, and a patent from the king of Scots, set seriously to work in five different moors—namely, Mannoch Muir and Robbart Muir in Nithsdale, the Friar Muir on Glengoner Water, and Crawford Muir in Clydesdale, and Glengaber Water in Henderland, Peeblesshire. ‘Upon Glengoner Water he builded a very fair country-house to dwell in; he furnished it fitting for himself and his family; he kept therein great hospitality; he purchased lands and grounds round about it; he kept thereupon many cattle, as horses, kine, sheep, &c. And he brought home a water-course for the washing of and cleansing of gold; by help thereof he got much straggling gold on the skirts of the hills and in the valleys, but none in solid places; which maintained himself then in great pomp, and thereby he kept open house for all comers and goers; as is reported, he feasted all sorts of people that thither came.’ A verse upon the lintel of the door of the house in Glengoner has been preserved:
Sir Bevis Bulmer built this bour,
Who levellèd both hill and moor;
Who got great riches and great honour
In Short-cleuch Water and Glengoner.[199]
1593-4.
Bulmer also set regular apparatus at work in Short-cleugh Water and Long-cleugh Braes, in Crawford Muir, and often found considerable quantities of the ore: in the latter place, his people found one piece of six ounces’ weight within two feet of the mosses. He also found a considerable quantity in Glengaber, but erected no apparatus there. After a persevering effort, he became embarrassed, in consequence, it is affirmed, of prodigal housekeeping, and retired from the adventure no richer than he commenced it.
Feb. 19.
‘... between twa and three hours in the morning, the queen was delivered of ane young prince, within the Castle of Stirling, in his majesty’s chalmer there; whilk was a great comfort to the haill people, moving them till great triumph, wantonness, and play, for banefires were set out, and dancing and playing usit, in all parts, as gif the people had been daft for mirth.’—Moy.
The king had scarcely seen his wife out of the perils of childbirth, when he was obliged to come to Edinburgh to take measures against the Earl of Bothwell, who was now breaking out into open rebellion. Fearing to live in Holyroodhouse, which had already been twice broken into by the turbulent lord, he took up his quarters in ‘Robert Gourlay’s lodging’ within the city.
Mar. 13.
‘... being Sunday, his majesty came to Mr Robert Bruce’s preaching, [who] said to his majesty, that God wald stir up mae Bothwells nor ane (that was, mae enemies to him nor Bothwell), if he revengit not his, and faucht not God’s quarrels and battles on the papists, before he faucht or revenged his awn particular.’—Bir.
1594. Apr. 3.
The king ‘came to the sermon, and there, in presence of the haill people, promised to revenge God’s cause, and to banish all the papists; and there requested the haill people to gang with him against Bothwell, wha was in Leith for the time. The same day, the king’s majesty rase, and the town of Edinburgh in arms. The Earl of Bothwell, hearing that his majesty was coming down, with the town of Edinburgh, rase with his five hundred horse, and rode up to the Hawk-hill, beside Lesterrick [Restalrig], and there stood till he saw the king and the town of Edinburgh approaching near him. He drew his company away through Duddingston. My Lord Home followed till the Woomet, at whilk place the Earl of Bothwell turned, thinking to have a hit at Home; but Home fled, and he followed; yet by chance little blood. The king’s majesty stood himself, seeing the said chase’ [at a safe distance, namely, on the Burgh-moor].—Bir.
1594. May.
Within a few days after this affair, the earl, seeing he could not effect his object, retired into England. Soon after, much to the scandal of the preachers, he joined the papist lords. All his plans, however, were frustrated; and early in the next year, he left Scotland, an utterly broken man, never again to give his royal cousin any trouble.
Kenneth Mackenzie of Kintail was rising to be a wealthy and influential man in the west of Inverness-shire. Beginning as simple chief of the Clan Kenzie, with a moderate estate, he ended as a peer of the realm and the lord of great possessions. A remarkable notice regarding him occurs at this time in the Privy Council Record, and it is the more so, as he had been for some time a member of that body. It is recited that he had, some time before, purchased a commission of justiciary from the king, for a district including the lands of certain neighbours, besides his own, and conferring the power of proceeding against persons accused of treasonable fire-raising. This was declared to have been given on wrong representations, and to be contrary to the laws of the kingdom, and Kenneth was commanded to appear by a certain day before the Council, and meanwhile abstain from acting upon the commission.—P. C. R.
July 4.
As a specimen of how nobles possessing castles acted towards meaner men who had fallen under their displeasure—James, Lord Hay of Yester, was charged before the Privy Council with having, on the ... day of June previous, gone to the house of ... Brown of Frosthill, and taken him forth thereof, and carried him to his ‘place of Neidpath,’ where ‘he put him in the pit thereof, and detenes him as captive, he being his majesty’s free subject ... having committit nae crime nor offence, and the said lord having nae power nor commission to tak him.’ The king had granted letters charging Lord Yester to liberate Brown, and that they should both come before him; and this had been of none effect. The matter being now before the Council, and a procurator having appeared for Brown to explain that he was still a prisoner at Neidpath, while Lord Yester made no appearance, officers were charged to go and denounce the latter as a rebel if he should refuse to obey the king’s command, Brown having meanwhile given surety to the extent of two hundred pounds that he should be ready to answer any accusation that might be brought against him.—P. C. R.
1594. July.
Robert Logan of Restalrig is one of the darkest characters of this bloody and turbulent time. A few years later, he was plotting with the Ruthvens of Gowrie for an assault upon the king. So early as February 1592-3, he was denounced for trafficking with the turbulent Bothwell. In June of this year, he was again denounced, and for a more serious matter—his sending out two servants, Jockie Houlden and Peter Craik, to rob travellers on the highway, near his house of Fast Castle in Berwickshire. They had attacked Robert Gray, burgess of Edinburgh, as he was passing the Boundrod, near Berwick, and taken from him nine hundred and fifty pounds, besides battering him to the peril of his life.—P. C. R. His residence, as is well known, was a fortalice perched on an almost inaccessible crag overhanging the waves of the sea, with black cliffs above, below, and nearly all round—perhaps the most romantically situated house in our ancient kingdom. Here, it is known, Logan had Bothwell for his occasional guest.
In July of this year, Logan entered into a contract with John Napier of Merchiston, proceeding upon the fact of ‘diverse auld reports, motives, and appearances, that there should be within the said Robert’s dwelling-place of Fast Castle a sowm of money and pose, hid and huirdit up secretly.’ John Napier undertook that he ‘sall do his utter and exact diligence to search and seek out, and be all craft and ingyne that he dow [can], to tempt, try, and find out the same, and, be the grace of God, either sall find out the same, or than mak sure that nae sic thing has been there.’ For this he was to have a third of any money found. He was also to be convoyed back in safety to Edinburgh, unspoiled of his gains.
As Logan was competent to make simple mechanical search for the supposed treasure without the aid of a philosopher, there is much reason to believe that Napier designed to use some pseudo-scientific mode or modes of investigation, such as the divining-rod, or the so-called magic numbers. The affair, therefore, throws a curious light on the state of philosophy even in the minds of the ablest philosophers of that age, the time when Tycho kept an idiot on account of his gift of prophecy, and Kepler perplexed himself with the Harmonices Mundi.
It is not known whether Napier did actually journey to the spray-beaten tower of Fast Castle, and there practise his craft and ingyne. Probably he did, and was disappointed in more ways than one, as, two years after, he is found letting a portion of his property to a gentleman on the strict condition that no part of it shall be sub-let to any one of the name of Logan.[200]
1594.
‘This year, in the Merse, there was a great business about sorcery and the trial of witches, and many was there burnt, as, namely, one Roughhead, and Cuthbert Hume’s mother of Dunse, the parson of Dunse’s wife, and sundry of Eyemouth and Coldingham; near a dozen moe, and many fugitives, as the old Lady A. Sundry others were delated, and the Ladies of Butt: and Lady B.: the Laird of B.: his sister; one in Liddesdale by virtue of [a] superstitious well, whereat was professed great skill; one Dick’s sister, who had her mother hanged before in Waughton. They confessed the death of the whole goods [live-stock] of the country.’—Pa. And.
Nov.
The disposition to violent and lawless acts at this time is strikingly shewn in the proceedings against Claud and Alexander, two sons of James Hamilton of Livingstone, in Linlithgowshire. Having some ground of offence against David Dundas of Priestinch, they had gone at mid-day with an armed party to his fold, and, there barbarously mutilated and slaughtered a number of his cattle. They and their elder brother, Patrick, also destroyed a mill leased by the same person, and further set fire to his barn-yard at Duddington. Two months afterwards, when John Yellowlees, a messenger, went with two assistants to the Peel of Livingstone, to deliver letters of citation against these young men, the laird, with his wife and four sons, came forth to the gate, and taking him first by the throat, proceeded to beat him unmercifully, and then, with a bended pistol at his breast, and many violent threats, forced him to eat and swallow his four letters, and to promise never to attempt to bring any such documents against them in future; besides which, they struck the two witnesses with swords and pistols, and left them for dead. The family were denounced as rebels.—Pit.
1594-5. Jan. 19.
A great tulyie or street-combat this day took place in Edinburgh.
1594-5.
The Earl of Montrose, head of the house of Graham, was of grave years—towards fifty: he was of such a character as to be chosen, a few years afterwards, as chancellor of the kingdom: still later, he became for a time viceroy of Scotland, the king being then in England. Yet this astute noble was so entirely under the sway of the feelings of the age, as to deem it necessary and proper that he should revenge the death of John Graham ([see under February 13, 1592-3]) upon its author, under circumstances similar to those which attended that slaughter. On its being known that the earl was coming with his son and retinue to Edinburgh, Sandilands was strongly recommended by some of his friends to withdraw from the town, ‘because the earl was then over great a party against him. His mind was, notwithstanding, sae undantonit, and unmindful of his former misdeed, finding himself not sae weel accompanied as he wald, he sent for friends, and convokit them to Edinburgh, upon plain purpose rather first to invade the said earl than to be invadit by him, and took the opportunity baith of time and place within Edinburgh, and made a furious onset on the earl [at the Salt Tron in the High Street], with guns and swords in great number.[201] The earl, with his eldest son, defendit manfully, till at last Sir James was dung [driven down] on his back, shot and hurt in divers parts of his body and head, [and] straitly invadit to have been slain out of hand, gif he had not been fortunately succoured by the prowess of a gentleman callit Captain Lockhart. The lord chancellor and Montrose were together at that time; but neither reverence [n]or respect was had unto him at this conflict, the fury was sae great on either side; sae that the chancellor retirit himself with gladness to the College of Justice. The magistrates of the town, with fencible weapons, separatit the parties for that time; and the greatest skaith Sir James gat on his party, for he himself was left for dead, and a cousin-german of his, callit Crawford of Kerse, was slain, and mony hurt: but Sir James convalescit again, and this recompense he obteinit for his arrogancy. On the earl’s side was but ane slain, and mony hurt.’—H. K. J.
Feb. 18.
Hercules Stewart was hanged at the Cross in Edinburgh, for his concern in the crimes of his brother the Earl of Bothwell. The people lamented his fate, for ‘he was ane simple gentleman, and not ane enterpriser.’—Moy. He ‘was suddenly cut down and carried up to the Tolbooth to be dressed; but within a little space he began to recover and move somewhat, and might by appearance have lived. The ministers, being advertised hereof, went to the king to procure for his life; but they had already given a new command to strangle him with all speed, so that no man durst speak in the contrary.’—Pa. And.
Mar. 10. 1595.
May 26.
Commenced ‘ane horrible tempest of snaw, whilk lay upon the ground till the 14[th] of April thereafter.’—Bir.
‘John Gilchrist, Henderson, and Hutton, all three [were] hangit for making of false writs and pressing to verify the same. Jun. 11. Ane callit Cuming the Monk [was] hangit for making of false writs.’—Bir.
July.
July 12.
Two gentlemen of Stirlingshire, one named Bruce, the other Forester, happened to love one woman, about whom they and their respective friends consequently quarrelled. At a meeting held by the parties with a view to composing differences, Bruce was hurt. Then the ‘clannit men’ of the names of Livingstone and Bruce in the Carse of Falkirk banded themselves together for revenge. A bailie of Stirling, named Forester, who had had no concern in the dispute, was soon after about to journey from Edinburgh to Stirling, when the friends of the deceased ‘belaid all the hieways for his return.’ Before he had gone many miles, they set upon him, and with sword and gun slew him. The most remarkable part of the affair was what followed. Forester being a special servant of the Earl of Mar, it was resolved that he should be buried with solemnity in Stirling. The corpse was met at Linlithgow by the earl and a large party of friends, with displayed banner, and in ‘effeir of weir.’ On their journey to Stirling, they passed through the lands of Livingstone and Bruce, exhibiting ‘a picture of the defunct on a fair canvas, painted with the number of the shots and wounds, to appear the more horrible to the behalders, and this way they completed his burial.’[202]—H. K. J.
Another curious circumstance followed. The parties involved in the homicide had a day of law appointed for them in Edinburgh, December 20th, and they, in customary style, summoned their respective friends to be present. A great attendance was expected; but the Privy Council, knowing there was deadly feid between a great number of them, ‘feirit that, upon the first occasion of their meeting, some great inconvenients sall fall out, to the break of his hieness’ peace, and troubling of the guid and quiet estate of the country[!], beside the hindering of justice,’ forbade the coming of such persons to Edinburgh under pain of ‘deid without favour.’—P. C. R.
Aug. 1.
1595.
Complaint was made to the Town Council of Edinburgh by the corporation of surgeons, against M. Awin, a French surgeon, for practising his art within the liberties of the city. He was ordered to desist, under a penalty, except for certain branches of surgery—namely, cutting for the stone, curing of ruptures, couching of cataracts, curing the pestilence, and diseases of women consequent on childbirth.[203]
Sep.
Sep. 13.
The violences of the age extended even to school-boys. The ‘scholars and gentlemen’s sons’ of the High School of Edinburgh had at this time occasion to complain of some abridgment of their wonted period of vacation, and when they applied to the Town Council for an extension of what they called their ‘privilege,’ only three days in addition to the restricted number of fourteen were granted. It appears that the master was favourable to their suit, but he was ‘borne down and abused by the Council, who never understood well what privilege belonged to that charge. Some of the chief gentlemen’s sons resolved to make a mutiny, and one day, the master being on necessary business a mile or two off the town, they came in the evening with all necessary provision, and entered the school, manned the same, took in with them some fencible weapons, with powder and bullet, and renforcit the doors, refusing to let [any] man come there, either master or magistrate, untill their privilege were fairly granted.’—Pa. And.
A night passed over. Next morning, ‘some men of the town came to these scholars, desiring them to give over, and to come forth upon composition; affirming that they should intercede to obtein them the license of other eight days’ playing. But the scholars replied that they were mocked of the first eight days’ privilege ... they wald either have the residue of the days granted for their pastime, or else they wald not give over. This answer was consulted upon by the magistrates, and notified to the ministers; and the ministers gave their counsel that they should be letten alone, and some men should be depute to attend about the house to keep them from vivres, sae that they should be compelled to render by extremity of hunger.’—H. K. J.
1595.
A day having passed in this manner, the Council lost patience, and determined to use strong measures. Headed by Bailie John Macmoran, and attended by a posse of officers, they came to the school, which was a long, low building standing on the site of the ancient Blackfriars’ monastery. The bailie at first called on the boys in a peaceable manner to open the doors. They refused, and asked for their master, protesting they would acknowledge him at his return, but no other person. ‘The bailies began to be angry, and called for a great jeist to prize up the back-door. The scholars bade them beware, and wished them to desist and leave off that violence, or else they vowed to God they should put a pair of bullets through the best of their cheeks. The bailies, believing they durst not shoot, continued still to prize the door, boasting with many threatening words. The scholars perceiving nothing but extremity, one Sinclair the chancellor of Caithness’ son, presented a gun from a window, direct opposite to the bailies’ faces, boasting them and calling them buttery carles. Off goeth the charged gun. [The bullet] pierced John Macmoran through his head, and presently killed him, so that he fell backward straight to the ground, without speech at all.’[204]
‘When the scholars heard of this mischance, they were all moved to clamour, and gave over. Certain of them escaped, and the rest were carried to prison by the magistrates in great fury, and escaped weel unslain at that instant. Upon the morn, the said Sinclair was brought to the bar, and was there accused of that slaughter; but he denied the same constantly. Divers honest friends convenit, and assisted him.’[205] The relatives of Macmoran being rich, money-offers were of no avail in the case: life for life was what they sought for. ‘Friends threatened death to all the people of Edinburgh(!) if they did the child any harm, saying they were not wise that meddled with the scholars, especially the gentlemen’s sons. They should have committed that charge to the master, who knew best the truest remedy without any harm at all.’
1595.
Lord Sinclair, as head of the family to which the young culprit belonged, now came forward in his behalf, and, by his intercession, the king wrote to the magistrates, desiring them to delay proceedings. Afterwards, the process was transferred to the Privy Council. Meanwhile, the other youths, seven in number, the chief of whom were a son of Murray of Spainyiedale and a son of Pringle of Whitebank, were kept in confinement upwards of two months, while a debate took place between the magistrates and the friends of the culprits as to a fair assize; it being alleged that one composed of citizens would be partial against the boys. The king commanded that an assize of gentlemen should be chosen, and, in the end, they, as well as Sinclair, got clear off.
The culprit became Sir William Sinclair of Mey. He married Catherine Ross of Balnagowan, whom we have seen unpleasantly mixed up in the charges against Lady Foulis, under July 22, 1590.
Bailie Macmoran’s House.
1595.
‘Macmoran,’ says Calderwood, ‘was the richest merchant in his time, but not gracious to the common people, because he carried victual to Spain, notwithstanding he was often admonished by the ministers to refrain.’ It would appear that he had been a servant of the Regent Morton, and afterwards was what is called a messenger, or sheriff’s officer.[206] We have also seen that, after the fall of Morton, he was reported to have been concerned in secreting the treasures which had been accumulated by his former master.[207] His house, still standing in Riddell’s Close in the Lawnmarket, Edinburgh, gives the idea that the style of living of a rich Scottish merchant of that day was far from being mean or despicable.
Sep. 22.
‘Among the constancies of the court this year, one was remarkable, that at Glasgow, in September, the king received the Countess of Bothwell into his favour, the 22d day, at night; and on the 3d of December, again proscribed and exiled her, under the pain of death; yet gave her a letter of protection, under his awn hand, within six days thereafter.’—Bal.
This inconstancy is partly explained away in the Privy Council Record, where it is stated that the countess abused the privilege of the letter granted to her by going about where she pleased and vaunting of her credit with the king, while in reality it was designed only to serve ‘for remaining of herself and her bairns within the place of Mostour, that her friends might sometime have resorted to her without danger to his hieness’s laws.’
Oct.
James Lord Hay of Yester, brother and successor of the turbulent Master of Yester already introduced to the reader, kept state in Neidpath Castle, with his wife, but as yet unblessed with progeny.[208] His presumptive heir was his second-cousin, Hay of Smithfield, ancestor of the present Sir Adam Hay of Haystoun. In these circumstances, occasion was given for a curious series of proceedings, involving the fighting of a regular passage of arms on a neighbouring plain beside the Tweed—a simple pastoral scene, where few could now dream that any such incident had ever taken place.
1595.
Lord Yester had for his page one George Hepburn, brother of the parson of Oldhamstocks in East Lothian. His master-of-the-horse—for such officers were then retained in houses of this rank—was John Brown of Hartree. One day, Brown, in conversation with Hepburn, remarked: ‘Your father had good knowledge of physic: I think you should have some also.’ ‘What mean ye by that?’ said Hepburn. ‘You might have great advantage by something,’ answered Brown. On being further questioned, the latter stated that, seeing Lord Yester had no children, and Hay of Smithfield came next in the entail, it was only necessary to give the former a suitable dose in order to make the latter Lord Yester. ‘If you,’ continued Brown, ‘could give him some poison, you should be nobly rewarded, you and yours.’ ‘Methinks that were no good physic,’ quoth Hepburn drily, and soon after revealed the project to his lord. Brown, on being taxed with it, stood stoutly on his denial. Hepburn as strongly insisted that the proposal had been made to him. For such a case, there was no solution but the duellium.
Due authority being obtained, a regular and public combat was arranged to take place on Edston-haugh, near Neidpath. The two combatants were to fight in their doublets, mounted, with spears and swords. Some of the greatest men of the country took part in the affair, and honoured it with their presence. The Laird of Buccleuch appeared as judge for Brown; Hepburn had, on his part, the Laird of Cessford. The Lords Yester and Newbottle were amongst those officiating. When all was ready, the two combatants rode full tilt against each other with their spears, when Brown missed Hepburn, and was thrown from his horse with his adversary’s weapon through his body. Having grazed his thigh in the charge, Hepburn did not immediately follow up his advantage, but suffered Brown to lie unharmed on the ground. ‘Fy!’ cried one of the judges, ‘alight and take amends of thy enemy!’ He then advanced on foot with his sword in his hand to Brown, and commanded him to confess the truth. ‘Stay,’ cried Brown, ‘till I draw the broken spear out of my body.’ This being done, Brown suddenly drew his sword, and struck at Hepburn, who for some time was content to ward off his strokes, but at last dealt him a backward wipe across the face, when the wretched man, blinded with blood, fell to the ground. The judges then interfered to prevent him from being further punished by Hepburn; but he resolutely refused to make any confession.[209]
1595.
About this time and for some time onward, Scotland underwent the pangs of a dearth of extraordinary severity, in consequence of the destruction of the crops by heavy rains in autumn. Birrel speaks of it as a famine, ‘the like whereof was never heard tell of in any age before, nor ever read of since the world was made.’ ‘In this month of October and November,’ he adds, ‘the wheat and malt at £10 the boll; in March thereafter [1596], the ait meal £10 the boll, the humble corn £7 the boll. In the month of May, the ait meal £20 the boll in Galloway. At this time there came victual out of other parts in sic abundance, that, betwixt the 1st of July and the 10th of August, there came into Leith three score and six ships laden with victual; nevertheless, the rye gave £10, 10s. and £11 the boll. The 2 of September, the rye came down and was sold for £7 the boll, and new ait meal for 7s. and 7s. 6d. the peck The 29 of October, the ait meal came up again at 10s. the peck. The 15 of July, the ait meal at 13s. 4d. the peck; the pease meal at 11s. the peck.
‘In this year, Clement Orr and Robert Lumsden, his grandson, bought before hand from the Earl Marischal, the bear meal overhead for 33s. 4d. the boll.’ ‘The ministers pronounced the curse of God against them, as grinders of the faces of the poor; which curse too manifestly lighted on them before their deaths.’—Bal.
As usual, the buying up and withholding of grain with the prospect of increased prices, was viewed with indignation by all classes of people. The king issued a proclamation in December 1595, attributing much of the misery of his people to ‘the avaritious greediness of a great number of persons that has bought and buys victual afore it come off the grund, and that forestalls and keeps the same to a dearth,’ and to ‘the shameless and indiscreet behaviour of the owners of the same victual, wha refuses to thresh out and bring the same to open markets.’ He threatened to put the laws in force against these guilty persons, and have the grain escheat to his majesty’s use.
Dec. 23.
1595.
The king professed to be at this time scandalised at the state of the commonweal, ‘altogether disorderit and shaken louss by reason of the deidly feids and controversies standing amangs his subjects of all degrees.’ Seeing how murder had consequently become a daily occurrence, he resolved upon a new and vigorous effort to bring the hostile parties to a reconciliation ‘by his awn pains and travel to that effect,’ so that the country might be the better fitted to resist the common enemy, now threatening invasion. The Privy Council, therefore, ordained letters to be sent charging the various parties to make their appearance before the king on certain days, wherever he might be for the time, each accompanied by a certain number of friends who might assist with their advice, but the whole party in each case ‘to keep their lodgings after their coming, while [till] they be specially sent for by his majesty.’
The groups of persons summoned were, Robert Master of Eglintoun, and Patrick Houston of that Ilk; James Earl of Glencairn, and Cunningham of Glengarnock; John Earl of Montrose, and French of Thorniedykes; Hugh Campbell of Loudon, sheriff of Ayr, Sandielands of Calder, Sir James Sandielands of Slamannan, Crawford of Kerse, and Spottiswoode of that Ilk; David Earl of Crawford and Guthrie of that Ilk; Sir Thomas Lyon of Auldbar, knight, and Garden of that Ilk; Alexander Lord Livingston, Sir Alexander Bruce, elder, of Airth, and Archibald Colquhoun of Luss; John Earl of Mar, Alexander Forester of Garden, and Andro M‘Farlane of Arrochar; James Lord Borthwick, Preston of Craigmiller, Mr George Lauder of Bass, and Charles Lauder son of umwhile Andro Lauder in Wyndpark; Sir John Edmonston of that Ilk, Maister William Cranston, younger, of that Ilk; George Earl Marischal and Seyton of Meldrum; James Cheyne of Straloch and William King of Barrach; James Tweedie of Drumelzier and Charles Geddes of Rachan. The nobles in every instance were allowed to have sixty, and the commoners twenty-four persons to accompany them to the place of agreement, and all, while attending, to have protection from any process of horning or excommunication which might have been previously passed upon them. Fire and sword was threatened against all neglecting to comply with the summons.
Earnest as the king seems now to have been, and influential as a royal tongue proverbially is, we know for certain that several of the parties now summoned continued afterwards at enmity.
1595-6. Mar. 15.
1595-6.
‘The king made ane orison before the General Assembly, with many guid promises and conditions. I pray God he may keep them, be content to receive admonitions [from the clergy], and be collected himself and his haill household, and to lay aside his authority royal and be as ane brother to them, and to see all the kirks in this country weel planted with ministers. There are in Scotland 900 kirks, of the whilk there are 400 without ministers or readers.’—Bir.
The admonitions which it was so desirable that the king should receive, were embodied in a paper called Offences in the King’s House, under the following heads: ‘1. The reading of the Word, and thanksgiving before and after meat, oft omitted. 2. Week-sermons oft neglected, and he would be admonished not to talk with any in time of divine service. 3. To recommend to him private meditation with God in spirit and in his awn conscience. 4. Banning and swearing is too common in the king’s house and court, occasioned by his example. 5. He would have good company about him: Robertland, papists, murderers, profane persons, would be removed from him. 6. The queen’s ministry would be reformed. She herself neglects Word and sacrament, is to be admonished for night-waking, balling, &c., also touching her company—and so of her gentlewomen.’—Row.
On the other hand, the king demanded of this assembly sundry concessions as to his power over the kirk, and that ministers should not be allowed to meddle with civil affairs or ‘to name any man in the pulpit, or so vively to describe him as it shall be equivalent to the very naming of him, except upon the notoriety of a public crime.’
1595-6.
On this occasion the clergy denounced the common corruption of all estates within this realm; namely, ‘an universal coldness, want of zeal, ignorance, contempt of the Word, ministry, and sacraments, and where knowledge is, yet no sense nor feeling, evidenced by the want of family exercises, prayer, and the Word, and singing of psalms; and if they be, they are profaned and abused, by calling on the cook, steward, or jackman to perform that religious duty ... superstition and idolatry entertained, evidenced in keeping of festival-days, fires, pilgrimages, singing of carols at Yule, &c. ... swearing, banning, and cursing: profanation of the Sabbath, especially by working in seed-time and harvest, journeying, trysting, gaming, dancing, drinking, fishing, killing, and milling: inferiors not doing duty to superiors, children having pleas of law against their parents, marrying without their consent; superiors not doing duty to inferiors, as not training up their children at schools in virtue and godliness; great and frequent breaches of duty between married persons: great bloodshed, deadly feuds arising thence, and assisting of bloodshedders for eluding of the laws: fornications, adulteries, incests, unlawful marriages and divorcements, allowed by laws and judges ... excessive drinking and waughting, gluttony (no doubt the cause of this dearth and famine), gorgeous and vain apparel, filthy speeches and songs: cruel oppressions of poor tenants ... idle persons having no lawful callings—as pipers, fiddlers, songsters, sorners, pleasants, strong and sturdy beggars living in harlotry.... Lying, finally, is a rife and common sin.’
1596. Apr. 12.
Sir Walter Scott of Branxholm, Laird of Buccleuch, performed an exploit which has been celebrated both in prose and rhyme.
About the end of January, a ‘day of truce’ was held at a spot called Dayholm of Kershope in Liddesdale, by the deputies of the English warden, Lord Scrope, and the Laird of Buccleuch, keeper of Liddesdale. The Scotch deputy, Scott of Goldielands, had but a small party—not above twenty—among whom, however, was a noted border reiver, William Armstrong of Kinmont, commonly known as Kinmont Willie. The English deputy was attended by several hundred followers. It happened that, before the end of the meeting, a report came to the English deputy of some outrages at that moment in the course of being committed by Scottish borderers within the English line. He entered a complaint on the subject, and received assurance that the guilty parties should be as soon as possible rendered up to the vengeance of Lord Scrope.
The day of truce ended peaceably; but, as the English party was retiring along their side of the Liddel, they caught sight of the Scottish reivers, and gave chase. Kinmont Willie was now riding quietly along the Scottish side of the Liddel. Mistaking him for one of the guilty troop, the English pursued him for three or four miles, and taking him prisoner, bore him off to Carlisle Castle.
Probably the Liddesdale thief had incurred more guilt in England than ten lives would have expiated. Yet what was this to Buccleuch? To him the case was simply that of a retainer betrayed while on his master’s business and assurance. If the affair had a public or national aspect, it was that of a Scottishman mistreated, to the dishonour of his sovereign and country. Having in vain used remonstrances with Lord Scrope, both by himself and through the king’s representations to the English ambassador, he resolved at last, as himself has expressed it, ‘to attempt the simple recovery of the prisoner in sae moderate ane fashion as was possible to him.’
1596.
Buccleuch’s moderate proceeding consisted in the assembling of two hundred armed and mounted retainers at the tower of Morton, an hour before sunset of the 12th of April. He had arranged that no head of any house should be of the number, but all younger brothers, that the consequences might be the less likely to damage his following; but, nevertheless, three lairds had insisted on taking part in the enterprise. Passing silently across the border, they came to Carlisle about the middle of the night. A select party of eighty then made an attempt to scale the walls of the castle; but their ladders proving too short, it was found necessary to break in by force through a postern on the west side. Two dozen men having got in, six were left to guard the passage, while the remaining eighteen passed on to Willie’s chamber, broke it up, and released the prisoner. All this was done without encountering any resistance except from a few watchmen, who were easily ‘dung on their backs.’[210] As a signal of their success, the party within the castle sounded their trumpet ‘mightily.’ Hearing this, Buccleuch raised a loud clamour amongst his horsemen on the green. At the same time, the bell of the castle began to sound, a beacon-fire was kindled on the top of the house, the great bell of the cathedral was rung in correspondence, the watch-bell of the Moot-hall joined the throng of sounds, and, to crown all, the drum began to rattle through the streets of the city. ‘The people were perturbit from their nocturnal sleep, then undigestit at that untimeous hour, with some cloudy weather and saft rain, whilk are noisome to the delicate persons of England, whaise bodies are given to quietness, rest, and delicate feeding, and consequently desirous of more sleep and repose in bed.’ Amidst the uproar, ‘the assaulters brought forth their countryman, and convoyit him to the court, where the Lord Scrope’s chalmer has a prospect unto, to whom he cried with a loud voice a familiar guid-nicht! and another guid-nicht to his constable Mr Saughell.’ The twenty-four men returned with Kinmont Willie to the main body, and the whole party retired without molestation, and re-entered Scotland with the morning light. ‘The like of sic ane vassalage,’ says the diarist Birrel, with unwonted enthusiasm, ‘was never done since the memory of man, no, not in Wallace’ days!’ Buccleuch himself, with true heroism, treated the matter calmly and even reasoningly. The simple recovery of the prisoner, he said, ‘maun necessarily be esteimit lawful, gif the taking and deteining of him be unlawful, as without all question it was.’
1596.
The matter was brought before the king in council (May 25) by the English ambassador, who pleaded that Sir Walter Scott should be given up to the queen for punishment. It was on this occasion that the border knight defended himself in the terms above quoted. Of course his own countrymen sympathised with him in a deed so gallant, and performed from such a motive, and the king could not readily act in a contrary strain. Elizabeth never obtained any satisfaction for the taking of Kinmont Willie.—Spot. Moy. H. K. J. C. K. S. P. C. R. Bir.[211]
1596 (?) Apr.
‘... there came an Englishman to Edinburgh, with a chestain-coloured naig, which he called Marroco ... he made him to do many rare and uncouth tricks, such as never horse was observed to do the like before in this land. This man would borrow from twenty or thirty of the spectators a piece of gold or silver, put all in a purse, and shuffle them together; thereafter he would bid the horse give every gentleman his own piece of money again. He would cause him tell by so many pats with his foot how many shillings the piece of money was worth. He would cause him lie down as dead. He would say to him: “I will sell you to a carter:” then he would seem to die. Then he would say: “Marroco, a gentleman hath borrowed you, and you must ride with a lady of court.” Then would he most daintily hackney, amble, and ride a pace, and trot, and play the jade at his command when his master pleased. He would make him take a great draught of water as oft as he liked to command him. By a sign given him, he would beck for the King of Scots and for Queen Elizabeth, and when ye spoke of the King of Spain, would both bite and strike at you—and many other wonderful things. I was a spectator myself in those days. But the report went afterwards that he devoured his master, because he was thought to be a spirit and nought else.’—Pa. And.
This was ‘the dancing horse’ to which Moth alludes in Shakspeare (Love’s Labour Lost, act I., sc. 2). The actual fate of Banks, the keeper of the animal, was not better than that which vulgar rumour assigned to him. It is almost an incredible, yet apparently well-authenticated fact, that horse and man, after wandering through various countries, were burnt together as magicians at Rome.
1596. May.
At this time, while the country was suffering from famine, there was a renewing of the Covenant with fasting and humiliation in St Andrews presbytery. ‘After this exercise,’ says James Melville, one of those chiefly concerned in ordering it, ‘we wanted not a remarkable effect.’ ‘God extraordinarily provided victuals out of all other countries, in sic store and abundance as was never seen in this land before;’ without which ‘thousands had died for hunger,’ ‘for,’ he goes on to say, ‘notwithstanding of the infinite number of bolls of victual that cam hame from other parts, all the harvest quarter of that year, the meal gave aucht, nine, and ten pounds the boll, and the malt eleven and twal, and in the south and west parts many died.’
June 7. 1596.
Napier, still brooding over the dangers from popery, devised at this time certain inventions which he thought would be useful for defending the country in case of invasion. One was a mirror like that of Archimedes, which should collect the beams of the sun, and reflect them concentratedly in one ‘mathematical point,’ for the purpose of burning the enemy’s ships. Another was a similar mirror to reflect artificial fire. A third was a kind of shot for artillery, not to pass lineally through an enemy’s host, destroying only those that stand in its way, but which should ‘range abroad within the whole appointed place, and not departing furth of the place till it had executed his [its] whole strength, by destroying those that be within the bounds of the said place.’ A fourth, the last, was a closed and fortified carriage to bring harquebussiers into the midst of an enemy—a superfluity, one would think, if there was any hopefulness in the third of the series. ‘These inventions, besides devices of sailing under the water, with divers other stratagems for harming of the enemies, by the grace of God and work of expert craftsmen, I hope to perform.’[212] So wrote Napier at the date noted in the margin. Sir Thomas Urquhart describes the third of the devices as calculated to clear a field of four miles’ circumference of all living things above a foot in height: by it, he said, the inventor could destroy 30,000 Turks, without the hazard of a single Christian. He adds that proof of its powers was given on a large plain in Scotland, to the destruction of a great many cattle and sheep—a particular that may be doubted. ‘When he was desired by a friend in his last illness to reveal the contrivance, his answer was that, for the ruin and overthrow of man, there were too many devices already framed, which if he could make to be fewer, he would, with his might, endeavour to do; and that therefore, seeing the malice and rancour rooted in the heart of mankind will not suffer them to diminish, the number of them, by any concert of his, should never be increased.’[213]
June 24.
John, Master of Orkney, was tried for the alleged crime of attempting to destroy the life of his brother the Earl of Orkney, first by witchcraft, and secondly by more direct means. The case broke down, and would not be worthy of attention in this place, but for the nature of the means taken to inculpate the accused. It appeared that the alleged witchcraft stood upon the evidence of a confession wrung from a woman called Alison Balfour, residing at Ireland, a village in Orkney, who had been executed for that imaginary crime in December 1594. The counsel for the Master shewed that, when this poor woman made her ‘pretended confession,’ as it might well be called, she had been kept forty-eight hours in the cashielaws—an instrument of torture supposed to have consisted of an iron case for the leg, to which fire was gradually applied, till it became insupportably painful. At the same time, her husband, a man of ninety-one years of age, her eldest son and daughter, were kept likewise under torture, ‘the father being in the lang irons of fifty stane wecht,’ the son fixed in the boots with fifty-seven strokes, and the daughter in the pilniewinks, that they, ‘being sae tormented beside her, might move her to make any confession for their relief.’ A like confession had been extorted from Thomas Palpla, to the effect that he had conspired with the Master to poison his brother, ‘he being kept in the cashielaws eleven days and eleven nights, twice in the day by the space of fourteen days callit [driven] in the boots, he being naked in the meantime, and scourgit with tows [ropes] in sic sort that they left neither flesh nor hide upon him; in the extremity of whilk torture the said pretended confession had been drawn out of him.’ Both of these witnesses had revoked their confessions, Alison Balfour doing so solemnly on the Heading Hill of Kirkwall, when about to submit to death for her own alleged crime, of which she at the same time protested herself to be innocent. These are among the most painful examples we anywhere find of the barbarous legal procedure of our ancestors.—Pit.
Aug. 3. 1596.
One John Dickson, an Englishman, was tried for uttering slanderous speeches against the king, calling him ‘ane bastard king,’ and saying ‘he was not worthy to be obeyed.’ This it appeared he had done in a drunken anger, when asked to veer his boat out of the way of the king’s ordnance. He was adjudged to be hanged.—Pit. It is curious on this and some other occasions to find that, while the king got so little practical obedience, and the laws in general were so feebly enforced, such a severe penalty was inflicted on acts of mere disrespect towards majesty.
Aug. 17.
The court was at this time unable to keep silence under the pelt of pasquils which it had brought upon itself. We have now a furious edict of Privy Council against the writers and promulgators of ‘infamous libels, buiks, ballats, pasquils, and cantels in prose and rhyme,’ which have lately been set out, and especially against ‘ane maist treasonable letter in form of a cockalane,[214] craftily divulgat by certain malicious, seditious, and unquiet spirits, uttering mony shameful and contumelious speeches, full of hatrent and dispite, not only against God, his servants and ministers, but maist unnaturally to the prejudice of the honour, guid fame, and reputation of the king and queen’s majesties, not sparing the prince their dearest son, besides their nobility, council, and guid subjects.’ The only active redress, however, was to proclaim a reward for the discovery of the offenders.—P. C. R.
Nov. 3.
Since November 1585, when he was driven from the king’s councils, James Stewart of Newton (sometime Earl of Arran) had lived in obscurity in the north.[215] Now that the Chancellor Maitland was dead, he formed a hope that possibly some use might be found for him at court; he therefore came to Edinburgh privately, and had an interview with the king at Holyroodhouse. He received some encouragement; but as nothing could be done for him immediately, and there were many enemies to reconcile, he bethought him of going to live for a while amongst his friends in Ayrshire, trusting erelong to be sent for.
1596.
The ex-favourite was travelling by Symington, in the upper ward of Lanarkshire, when some one who knew him gave him warning that he was come into a dangerous neighbourhood, for not far from the way he was about to pass dwelt a leading man of that house of Douglas which he had mortally offended by his prosecution of the Regent Morton. This was Sir James Douglas of Parkhead, whose father was a natural brother of the regent: he was now the husband of the heiress of the house of Carlyle of Torthorald, and a man of consideration. Stewart replied disdainfully that he was travelling where he had a right to be, and he would not go out of his way for Parkhead nor any other of the house of Douglas. A mean person who overheard this speech made off and reported it to Douglas, who, on hearing it, rose from table, where he had been dining, and vowed he would have the life of Stewart at all hazards. He immediately mounted, and with three servants rode after his enemy through a valley called the Catslack. When Stewart saw himself pursued, he asked the name of the place, and being told, desired his people to come on with all possible speed, for he had got a response from some soothsayer to beware of that spot. Parkhead speedily overtook him, struck him from his horse, and then mercilessly killed him. Cutting off the head, he caused it to be carried by a servant on the point of a spear, thus verifying another weird saying regarding Stewart, that he should have the highest head in Scotland. His body was left on the spot, to become the prey of dogs and swine.[216]
Thus perished an ex-chancellor of Scotland, one who had been permitted for a time to treat the world as if it had only been made for his own aggrandisement, who had governed a king, struck down a regent, and made the greatest of the old nobility of the country tremble. Violence, insolence, and cruelty had been the ruling principles of his life, and, as Spottiswoode says, ‘he was paid home in the end.’ No decided effort was made to execute justice upon his slayer;[217] but it will be afterwards found that the Ochiltree Stewarts did not forget his death. ([See under July 1608].)
Dec. 17. 1596.
An edict of the king against what he called unlawful convocations of the clergy, had raised a general uneasiness and excitement, many believing that all independent action of the clergy was struck at. The prosecution of a minister named David Black, who had slandered the king and queen in the pulpit, and refused to submit to a secular tribunal, added to the turmoil. James had further raised a great distrust regarding his fidelity to the Protestant religion by his allowing the exiled papist lords to return to their own country. It was at this crisis that the tumult long known in French fashion as the Seventeenth of December took place.
‘... being Friday, his majesty being in the Tolbooth sitting in session, and ane convention of ministers being in the New Kirk Bir.
1596.
The king either was really exasperated or pretended to be so. Retiring to Linlithgow next day, he sent orders to Edinburgh, discharging the courts of justice from sitting there, commanding one minister to be imprisoned and others to be put to the horn, and citing the magistrates to come and answer for the seditious conduct of their people. Great was the consternation thus produced, insomuch that one Sunday passed without public worship—‘the like of which had not been seen before.’ On the last day of the year, James returned, to all appearance charged with the most alarming intentions against the city. A proclamation was issued, commanding certain lords and Border chiefs of noted loyalty to occupy certain ports and streets. There consequently arose a rumour ‘that the king’s majesty should send in Will Kinmont, the common thief, as should spulyie the town of Edinburgh. Upon the whilk, the haill merchants took their haill geir out of their booths and shops, and transportit the same to the strongest house that was in the town, and remainit in the said house with themselves, their servants, and looking for nothing but that they should have all been spulyit. Siclike, the haill craftsmen and commons convenit themselves, their best goods, as it were ten or twelve households in ane, whilk was the strongest house, and might be best keepit from spulying and burning, with hagbut, pistolet, and other sic armour, as might best defend themselves. Judge, gentle reader, gif this be playing! Thir noblemen and gentlemen, keepers of the ports and Hie Gait, being set at the places foresaid, with pike and spear, and other armour, stood keeping the foresaid places appointit, till his majesty came to St Giles’s Kirk, Mr David Lindsay making the sermon. His majesty made ane oration or harangue, concerning the sedition of the seditious ministers, as it pleased him to term them.’—Bir.
The affair ended three months after, in a way that supports the opinion of the Laird of Dumbiedykes, that ‘it’s sad work, but siller will help it.’ March 22d, ‘the town of Edinburgh was relaxed frae the horn, and received into the king’s favour again, and the session ordained to sit down in Edinburgh the 25th of May thereafter.’ Next day, ‘the king drank in the council-house with the bailies, council, and deacons. The said bailies and council convoyit his majesty to the West Port thereafter. In the meantime of this drinking in the council-house, the bells rang for joy of their agreement; the trumpets sounded, the drums and whistles played, with [as] many other instruments of music as might be played on; and the town of Edinburgh, for the tumult-raising the 17 of December before, was ordained to pay to his majesty thretty thousand merks Scottish.’—Bir.
1596-7.
John Mure, of Auchindrain, in Ayrshire, was a gentleman of good means and connections, who acted at one time in a judicial capacity as bailie of Carrick, and gave general satisfaction by his judgments. He was son-in-law to the Laird of Bargeny, one of the three chief men of the all-powerful Ayrshire family of Kennedy. Sir Thomas Kennedy of Colzean, another of these great men, was on bad terms with Bargeny. Mure, who might naturally be expected to take his father-in-law’s side, was for a time restrained by some practical benefits, in the shape of lands, offered to him by Sir Thomas; but the titles to the lands not being ultimately made good, the Laird of Auchindrain conceived only the more furious hatred against the knight of Colzean. This happened about 1595, and it appears at the same time that Sir Thomas had excited a deadly rage in the bosom of the Earl of Cassillis’s next brother, usually called the Master of Cassillis. The Master and Auchindrain, with another called the Laird of Dunduff, easily came to an understanding with each other, and agreed to slay Sir Thomas Kennedy the first opportunity. Such was the manner of conducting a quarrel about land-rights and despiteful words amongst gentlemen in Ayrshire in those days.
Jan. 1.
On the evening of the 1st of January, Sir Thomas Kennedy supped with Sir Thomas Nisbet in the house of the latter at Maybole. The Lairds of Auchindrain and Dunduff, with a few servants, lay in wait for him in the yard, and when he came forth to go to his own house to bed, they fired their pistols at him. ‘He being safe of any hurt therewith, and perceiving them with their swords most cruelly to pursue his life, ... was forced for his safety to fly; in which chase they did approach him so near, as he had undoubtedly been overta’en and killed, if he had not adventured to run aside and cover himself with the ruins of ane decayed house; whilk, in respect of the darkness of the night, they did not perceive; but still followed to his lodging, and searched all the corners thereof, till the confluence of the people ... forced them to retire.’[218]
For this assault, Sir Thomas Kennedy pursued at law the Lairds of Auchindrain and Dunduff, and was so far successful that Dunduff had to retire into England, while ‘Colzean gat the house of Auchindrain, and destroyit the ... plenishing, and wrackit all the garden. And also they made mony sets [snares] to have gotten [Auchindrain] himself; but God preservit him from their tyranny.’[219] Auchindrain, however, was forced ‘to cover malice by show of repentance, and for satisfaction of his bypast offence, and gage of his future duty, to offer his eldest son in marriage to Sir Thomas Kennedy’s dochter; whilk, by intercession of friends, [was] accepted.’[220]
We shall hear more of this feud hereafter (see under December 11, 1601).
Feb. 17. 1596-7.
Under a commission from the king, the provost and bailies of Aberdeen commenced a series of witch-trials of a remarkable kind. The first delinquent, Janet Wishart, spouse of John Lees, stabler—a woman considerably advanced in life—was accused of a great number of maléfices perpetrated, during upwards of thirty years, against neighbours, chiefly under a spirit of petty revenge. In the greater number of cases, the victim was described as being seized with an ailment under which he passed through the extremes of heat and cold, and was afflicted with an insatiable drouth. In several cases the illness had a fatal conclusion. For instance, James Low, stabler, having refused Janet the loan of his kiln and barn, took a dwining illness in consequence, ‘melting away like ane burning candle,’ till he died. John, in his last moments, declared his belief that, if he had lent Janet his kiln and barn, he would still have been a living man. ‘By the whilk witchcraft casten upon him, and upon his house, his wife died, his only son [fell] in the same kind of sickness, and his haill geir, surmounting three thousand pounds, are altogether wrackit and away.’ It was considered sufficient proof on this point, that sundry persons testified to having heard James lay on Janet the blame of his misfortunes. Another person had been ruined in his means, in consequence of his wife obeying a direction of Janet for the insurance of constant prosperity—namely, taking nine pickles of wheat and a piece of rowan-tree, and putting them in the four nooks of the house. Janet had also caused a dozen fowls belonging to a neighbour to fall from a roost dead at her feet. She raised wind for winnowing some malt in her own house, at a moment of perfect calm, by putting a piece of live coal at each of two doors. She caused a neighbour’s cow to give something like venom instead of milk. A Mart ox which she wished to buy, became furious; wherefore she got it at her own price, and on her laying her hands on it, the animal became quiet. There is also a terrible recital of her causing a neighbour to accompany her to the gallows in the Links, where she cut pieces from the various members of a dead culprit, to be used for effecting some of her devilish purposes. This story was only reported by one who had received it from the woman herself, now deceased; but it passed as equally good evidence with the rest. It was alleged that, twenty-two years ago, she had been found sitting in a field of green corn before sun-ris, when, being asked what she was doing, she said: ‘I have been peeling the blades of the corn: I find it will be ane dear year; the blade of the corn grows withershins [contrary to the course of the sun]: when it grows sungates about [in the direction of the sun’s course], it will be ane cheap year.’ One of the last points in the dittay was that, for eight days before her apprehension, ‘continually there was sic ane fearful rumbling in thy house, that William Murray, cordiner, believit the house he was into, next to thy house, should have fallen and smoorit him and his haill bairns.’ This poor woman appears to have been taken to the stake immediately after her trial.
Her son, Thomas Lees, was accused of having aided her in her evil deeds, and being ‘ane common witch and sorcerer,’ and his trial (February 23) brings out some curious points. He was accused of having been one of a large company of witches and sorcerers who had gone to the Market and Fish Crosses of Aberdeen at midnight of the previous Halloween (All Saints’ Eve), ‘under the guiding and conduct of the devil ... playing before you on his kind of instruments.’ The company were all transformed, some as hares, some as cats, some in other likenesses, and all danced about the two crosses and the meal-market a long space of time, Thomas being the leader of the ring. One Catherine Mitchell being somewhat laggard, he beat her to make her go faster; a fact to which Catherine herself now bore witness. A woman with whom Thomas had been too intimate also testified to his having offered to take her to Murrayland and marry her, telling her that by the way, at the foot of a particular mountain, he could raise a spirit able to provide them with all necessaries. This poor fellow was also condemned to the flames. The husband and daughters of Janet Wishart—the latter of whom are taxed as well known to be ‘quick gangand devils’—narrowly escaped with banishment from the city.
1597.
Helen Fraser, who was tried in April, was accused of many witchcrafts of common kinds, and of some less common. For instance, she had translated a sickness from a man’s horse to his cow, and, worse than that, the affection of Andrew Tullideff from his wife to a woman called Margaret Neilson, ‘and sae michtily bewitchit him, that he could never be reconceillit with his wife, or remove his affection frae the said harlot.’ Another man, Robert Merchant by name, who had been married happily to Christian White for two years, being taken to sow corn for a widow named Isobel Bruce, at the Murihill of Foveran, where Helen Fraser was then living, ‘fand his affection violently and extraordinarily drawn away from the said Christian to the said Isobel, ane great luve being betwixt him and the said Christian always theretofore, and nae break of luve or discord falling out or intervening upon either of their parts: whilk thing the country supposit to be brought about by the unlawful travelling of the said Helen’—and was further testified by Robert himself. Helen was likewise convicted, and of course burnt.
1597.
Isobel Cockie took from cows the power of giving healthful milk, making them give a poisonous stuff instead. She also prevented good milk from ‘yirning.’ Horses had fallen dead under her touch.
Men against whom she had pronounced evil words took deadly sicknesses in consequence, or suffered a decay in their worldly means. Her house being ruinous, the proprietor, Alexander Anderson, had come in her absence, and was proceeding to mend the roof, when she came home, and finding he had uncovered her pantry, where her valuables lay, she said: ‘I shall gar thee forthink it, that thou hast tirrit my house, I being frae hame,’ and glowrit up at him. Immediately Alexander’s speech went from him, and he retired to bed sick, and could get no rest or sleep. Under the threats of his son, she was induced to come and charm this sickness away from him, and ‘gave him droggis, that his speech came to him again.’[221] By the confession of the recently burnt Thomas Lees, Isobel Cockie had been second to himself in the infernal dance at the Fish Cross, ‘and because the devil playit not so melodiously and weel as thou cravit, thou took his instrument out of his mouth, then took him on the chafts therewith, and playit thyself thereon to the haill company.’ Isobel was likewise condemned.
1597.
It would be tedious to enter into the long series of trials which extended over this year in and near Aberdeen; but a few particulars are worth giving. The case of Andrew Man, an aged person, formerly of Tarbrugh, in the parish of Rathven, involves a more imaginative style of warlockry than is common. According to his own confessions—that is to say, the hallucinations which he described—the devil came sixty years ago to his mother’s house, in the form of a woman, called the Queen of Elfen, and was delivered of a bairn; at which time, he being a boy, bringing in water, was promised by this distinguished stranger ‘that thou should know all things; and should help and cure all sorts of sickness, except stand-deid, and that thou should be weel enterteinit, but wald seek thy meat ere thou de’ed, as Thomas Rhymer did.’ Thirty-two years before, he had begun a guilty intercourse with this Queen of Elfen, at whose first coming, ‘she caused ane of thy cattle die upon ane hillock called the Elf-hillock, but promised to do him good thereafter.’ Andrew, according to his own account, could ‘cure the falling-sickness, the bairn-bed, and all other sorts of sickness that ever fell to man or beast, except the stand-deid, by baptising them, reabling them in the auld corunschbald, and striking of the gudis on the face, with ane fowl in thy hand, and by saying thir words: “Gif thou will live, live; and gif thou will die, die!” with sundry other orisons, sic as of Sanct John and the three silly brethren, whilk thou can say when thou please, and by giving of black wool and salt as a remeid for all diseases and for causing a man prosper and that his blude should never be drawn.’ He had cured several persons by his enchantments, one mode being to put the patient nine times through a hasp of unwatered yarn, and then a cat as many times backward through the same hasp, the effect of which was to translate the sickness from the patient to the cat.
The devil, whom Andrew called Christsonday, and believed to be an angel, was raised by the word Benedicite, and laid again by taking a dog under his armpit, casting the same in the devil’s mouth, and speaking the word Maikpeblis. ‘The Queen of Elfen has a grip of all the craft, but Christsonday is the guidman, and has all power under God, and thou kens sundry deid men in their company, and the king that died at Flodden and Thomas Rhymer is there.’
‘Upon Rood-day in harvest, in this present year, whilk fell on a Wednesday, thou saw Christsonday come out of the snaw in likeness of a staig [young male horse], and the Queen of Elfen was there, and others with her, riding upon white hackneys.’ ‘The elves have shapes and claithes like men, and will have fair covered tables, and they are but shadows, but are starker [stronger] nor men, and they have playing and dancing when they please; the queen is very pleasand, and will be auld and young when she pleases; she makes any king whom she pleases.... The elves will make thee appear to be in a fair chalmer, and yet thou will find thyself in a moss on the morn. They will appear to have candles, and licht, and swords, whilk will be nothing else but dead grass and straes.’ Andrew denied his guilt, but was nevertheless convicted, and doubtless burnt.
In the dittay against Marjory Mutch, it was alleged that, having an ill-will against William Smith in Tarserhill, she came to his plough and bewitched the oxen, so that ‘they instantly ran all wood [mad], brak the pleuch, twa thereof ran over the hills to Deer, and other twa thereof up Ithan side, whilk could never be tane nor apprehendit again.’ This woman was said to have destroyed much cattle, laid sickness on many persons, and attended all the witch conventions of the district. In token of her being a witch, there was a spot under her left ear, into which a gentleman had thrust a pin without producing any pain.
1597.
Margaret Clark, being sent for by the wife of Nicol Ross, when she was in childbed, ‘cast the haill dolours, sickness, and pains whilk she should have susteinit, upon Andrew Harper, wha, during all the time of her travelling, was exceedingly and marvellously troubled, in ane fury and madness as it were, and could not be halden; and how soon the said gentlewoman was delivered, the pains departed frae the said Andrew.’
It is alleged of Violet Leys, that, her husband, a mariner, being discharged from William Finlay’s ship, she and her late mother bewitched the said ship, ‘that, since thy husband was put forth of the same, she never made one good voyage, but either the master or merchants at some times through tempest of weather, were forced to cast overboard the greatest part of their lading, or then to perish, men, ship, and geir.’ Several of the other culprits are accused of raising and calming the wind at pleasure.[222]
It appears that at this time twenty-two unfortunate men and women, chiefly the latter, suffered in Aberdeen and its neighbourhood. Such a tremendous sacrifice to superstition would in itself be worthy of special notice here; but it becomes the more so from a probability which appears that Shakspeare must have been acquainted with the details of these trials. It will be found that the chief of his company, Lawrence Fletcher, was in Aberdeen with a party of comedians in October 1601. That Shakspeare was of the party is not certain; but there is no fact to militate against the probability that he was. Mr Charles Knight[223] has shewn that in these trials there occur many things which strongly recall passages in the witch-scenes of Macbeth—as if those scenes had been written by one who had thoroughly studied the dittays against Janet Wishart and her associates. Nearly all of those women—and it is very much a special feature of this group of cases—had laid heavy disease on those whom they held at ill-will, causing them to suffer fearful pains, and their strength to decay.
‘He shall live a man forbid:
Weary seven nights nine times nine,
He shall dwindle, peak, and pine.’
1597.
Such are the dread words of the Macbeth hags. We see that the Aberdeen witches had power over the winds; so had those of Macbeth. Banquo says to the weird sisters:
‘If you can look into the seeds of time,
And say which grain will grow, and which will not,
Speak then to me.’
This, it must be acknowledged, is wonderfully like a suggestion to the imagination from such a fact as that of Janet Wishart’s vaticinations among the growing corn. The witch-dance at the Fish Cross is much like those under the guidance of Hecate; and Wishart’s dealing with the malefactor’s corpse at the gallows on the Links, might well furnish a hint for the incantations over the caldron.
‘Grease that’s sweaten
From the murderer’s gibbet, throw
Into the flame.’
And perhaps even the humble cantrip of Marjory Mutch with William Smith’s oxen, might suggest the fine passage descriptive of the conduct of Duncan’s horses at his death; when they
‘Turned wild in nature, broke their stalls, flung out,
Contending ’gainst obedience, as they would
Make war with mankind.’
‘If it be not,’ says Mr Knight, in concluding this curious speculation, ‘to inquire too curiously, may we not trace one of the most striking passages in Othello to the humble source of an Aberdeen superstition?’
“That handkerchief
Did an Egyptian to my mother give;
She was a charmer, and could almost read
The thoughts of people: she told her, while she kept it,
’Twould make her amiable, and subdue my father
Entirely to her love.”
1597.
In the information against Isobell Straquhan, it is alleged that “the said Isobell came to Elspet Mutrey in Wodheid, she being a widow, and asked of her if she had a penny to lend her, and the said Elspet gave her the penny; and the said Isobell took the penny, and bowit [bent] it, and took a clout and a piece red wax, and sewed the clout with a thread, the wax and the penny being within the clout, and gave it to the said Elspet Mutrey, commanding her to use the said clout to hang about her craig [neck], and when she saw the man she loved best, take the clout, with the penny and wax, and stroke her face with it, and she so doing, should attain in to the marriage of that man whom she loved.”
The “clout” sewed “with a thread” wants, indeed, the poetical colouring of the “handkerchief” of Othello; but still
“There’s magic in the web of it.”
More curious in the effects produced is another example of the “prophetic fury” of the “sibyl” Isobell Straquhan. She could not only produce love, but remove hatred: Walter Ronaldson had used to strike his wife, who took consultation with Scudder (alias Straquhan), and ‘she did take pieces of paper, and sew them thick with thread of divers colours, and did put them in the barn amongst the corn, and from henceforth the said Walter did never strike his wife, neither yet once found fault with her, whatsoever she did. He was subdued “entirely to her love.”’
1596-7. Mar. 11.
The duellium seems to have been particularly in vogue at this time. ‘There chanced a single combat betwixt James Hepburn of Moreham and one Birnie, a skinner in Edinburgh [at St Leonard’s Craigs]. They were both slain [and buried the morning after]. The occasion and quarrel was not thought to be great nor yet necessary. Hepburn alleged and maintained that there was seven sacraments; Birnie would have but two, or else he would fight. The other was content with great protestations that he would defend his belief with the sword; and so, with great earnestness, they yoked, and thus the question was decided.’—P. And.
1596-7.
There was a traditionary tale in Edinburgh, which Sir Walter Scott had heard in his youth, and which he narrated to the author of this work in 1824, to the effect that, a gentleman having been foully murdered by a man of formidable repute as a swordsman, his widow brought forward two sons in succession to challenge the murderer to mortal combat, and when these had fallen, did not scruple even to send a third, her youngest and favourite, to avenge the slaughter of the rest; thus imitating, as Sir Walter remarked, the conduct of Don Arias Gonzalo, in sending his three sons in succession to meet Don Diego Ordoñez, when the latter challenged the people of Zamora for sheltering the traitor Vellido—as related in the Chronicle of the Cid.[224] The two first youths, like the sons of Don Diego, ‘died like good men in their duty;’ but the third slew the murderer. The last fight, said Sir Walter, took place on Cramond Island in the Firth of Forth, and since then there has been no such combat permitted. Apparently the basis of this story is as follows:
Mar. 15.
James Carmichael, second son of the Laird of Carmichael, had killed Stephen Bruntfield, captain of Tantallon, in a duel at St Leonard’s Craigs, 22d December 1596. Adam Bruntfield, brother of the deceased, ‘allegit that James Carmichael had slain his brother by treason, having promisit to meet him hand to hand, and had brought others with him to his slaughter, and therefore was a traitor. The other stood to his denial, and they baith seyit [tried] their moyen [influence] at his majesty’s hands for ane license to fecht, whilk with great difficulty was granted by his grace.’ They met on Barnbougle Sands or Links,[225] in the presence of a great multitude, and with the Duke of Lennox, the Laird of Buccleuch, Sir James Sandilands, and Lord Sinclair, to act as judges. ‘The one was clothed in blue taffeta, the other in red sattin.’ Carmichael, who was ‘as able a like man as was living,’ seemed at first to have great advantage over Adam Bruntfield, who was ‘but ane young man, and of mean stature;’ and at the first encounter he struck Adam on the loin. To the surprise of all, however, Bruntfield ‘strikes him in the craig [neck], and syne loups aboon him, and gives him sundry straiks with his dagger, and sae slays him. Adam Bruntfield is convoyit to Edinburgh with great triumph as ane victorious captain; and the other borne in deid.’—Bir. Pa. And. C. K. Sc.
1597. Mar. (?)
This spring, there was ‘sic increase of sawing, that the like has not been heard of before. Ane man of Libberton, callit Douglas, had, of ten pecks of beir sawn thirty-one thrave, and every threif had ane boll of beir and ane peck.’—Bir.
Apr. 20. 1597.
‘At this time, one Sir James Mac Oniel [Mac Connel], alias Sorley Buie, a great man in Ireland, being here for the time to complain of our chief islesmen, was knighted, and went with his train and dependers to visit the Castle and provision therein, and gave great and noble rewards to the keepers.’—Pa. And. ‘The 7th of May, he went homeward, and for honour of his bonalley[226] the cannons shot out of the Castle of Edinburgh.’—Bir. ‘This Sir James was ane man of Scottis bluid, albeit his lands lies in Ireland. He was ane braw man of person and behaviour, but had not the Scots tongue, nor nae language but Erse [Irish].’—C. K. Sc.
June 6.
There was a proclamation ‘that no man take upon hand to give out money any dearer nor ten for the hundred [ten per cent. interest], or victual according thereto, under the pain of confiscation of their goods, and punishing of their bodies as usurers.’—Bir.
June 10.
Died Hugh Rose of Kilravock, at an advanced age. A descendant describes him as ‘ane excellent person.’ ‘He found the fortune [of the family] low, and under great burden, which he not only defrayed, leaving it free to his son, but also acquired the whole lands now holden of the Bishop of Moray. He had seventeen sisters and daughters, all whose portions, mediately or immediately, he paid, though their very portions were a considerable debt. He lived in a very divided factious time, there falling out then great revolutions in church and state; religion changed from popery to protestant, and the queen laid aside, living in exile; yet such was his even, ingenious, prudential carriage, that he wanted not respect from the most eminent of all parties. He had troubles from neighbours, which he prudently carried, and yet knew how discreetly to resent them, as appears, that a debate being betwixt him and two neighbours, he subscribed: “Hucheon Rose of Kilravock, ane honest man, ill guided betwixt them both.” This was ridentem dicere verum.
‘He was a man that could make good use of his troubles, as appears by his answer to King James, who, being in Kilravock in his progress to the north (in the year 1589, as I suppose), inquired how he could live amongst such ill turbulent neighbours; [he] made this reply: “That they were the best neighbours he could have, for they made him thrice a day go to God upon his knees, when perhaps otherwise he would not have gone once.” And at the same time, as I have learned many years ago from old persons, the king was pleased to honour him with the name of Father, and desiring he might be covered.
1597.
‘As to his person, I have had it from such as knew him, that he was of a tall, and of a square well-compact body, but not corpulent. He was of a venerable grave aspect; his beard white and long in his old age. He died full of days, not so much of sickness as nature being worn out. The night before his death, he went forth to his orchard, and there supped upon a little broth, and then going to his bed, died the next morning, without trouble, muttering these words in Latin at his expiring: “In manus tuas, Domine, commendo spiritum meum.”‘[227]
June 26.
This was a day of great joy to the friends of the reformed faith, for the Earls of Huntly and Errol had at length been wrought upon to make profession of the true religion, and so be relaxed from the pains of excommunication. Though the pressing nature of the motive was obvious, no dread of insincerity seems ever to have entered the minds of the honest zealots who left these lords no other course for their preservation. The affair took place in the kirk of Aberdeen, and was in several respects noticeable. The evening before, the Earl of Huntly shook hands in token of reconciliation with Lord Forbes and young Irvine of Drum, and signed the articles of the established religion, swearing not to decline therefrom. On the Sunday, which was observed as a fast, on account of the importance of this conversion, the two nobles appeared in the marriage desk or pew in the Old Kirk, where was ‘sic a confluence of noblemen, barons, gentlemen, and common people, as that the like was never seen in that kirk.’
1597.
To pursue the narrative of an eye-witness: ‘The bishop preached, and made a godly and excellent sermon. The sermon being concluded, the earls rises furth of their desk, comes in before the pulpit, make ane open confession of their defection and apostasy, affirms the religion presently confessed to be the only true religion, renounces all papistry, &c., and of new swears never to decline again, but to defend the samen to their life’s end. The Earl of Huntly confessed his offence, first to God, next to his majesty, to the kirk and country, for the slaughter of the Earl of Moray. And sae the bishop pronounces openly their sentence of absolution frae the sentence of excommunication. The earls are then received by the haill ministry, being in number twelve or thirteen persons, wha, during all the time of the sermon, sat at the table in the mids’ of the kirk, and with them the provost, bailies, and maist part of the council. And after the earls were received by the ministry, then Patrick Murray, commissioner for his majesty, received them in his hieness’ name; next the provost, bailies, and council. And sae they were received to the bosom of the kirk. At the samen time, the Laird of Gight, before the pulpit, sat down on his knees, and askit God, his majesty, and the kirk pardon and forgiveness for the receipt of the Earl of Bothwell, for the whilk he was excommunicate; and he was absolved frae the excommunication. This being done, the twa earls, with mony mae gentlemen and barons, all the ministry, communicate together at the table of the Lord.’...
Next day, the Market Cross was solemnly hung with tapestry, and in a small house close by a band of musicians was placed. Four score of the young men of the town, in their best habiliments, with hagbuts, took their station around. There also were placed the magistrates and council, with six maskers. On a table set out in the street were wine, glasses, and sweetmeats. The earls’ pacification was then formally proclaimed by Marchmont herald. ‘The twa earls sat at the Cross in chairs, with his majesty’s commissioner and the ministry. The wand of peace delivered to them by Patrick Murray, he receives them in his majesty’s name; next the ministry embraces them, and then the provost, bailies, and magistrates. Hagbuts sounded, that day nor dur could not be heard; wine drunk in abundance; glasses broken; sirfootfeats casten abroad on the causey, gather whaso please! After this the earls and their kin passes to the Tolbooth, with the haill ministry; all are made burgesses of this town, the ministry with the rest. At even, naething but waughting.’[228]
Of course, all was a forced hypocrisy on the part of the two lords, merely to avoid the legal consequences of their excommunication. Most curious it would be to know if there were no misgivings on the subject among the clergy: certainly none appear. Huntly, as might have been expected, quickly relapsed to his popish professions, and was again excommunicated in 1606. Nevertheless, he was some years later accepted once more as a Protestant, and restored to his civil rights.
1597.
A deputation of ministers went this summer through the provinces of Aberdeen, Moray, and Ross, to complete as far as possible the planting of them with ministers. The chief of the Clan Mackintosh surprised the deputation by the zeal and cordiality he shewed towards the object. He met them at Inverness, exhibited a plan for settling ministers in his country, and subscribed it in their presence. ‘Now,’ said he, ‘it may be thought I am liberal because nae minister will venture to come amang us. Get me men and sey [try] me. I will find sufficient caution in St Johnston, Dundee, or Aberdeen, for safety of their persons, obedience to their doctrine and discipline, and guid payment of their stipend.’—Ja. Mel. We have seen enough of the leading men of this age in Scotland not to be too much surprised on learning that this was the same Highland chief who had sent out his clan on a wild ravaging expedition in 1592, when the hospitable old baron of Brackla was one of their victims, and who is summed up in the Historie of King James the Sext, as ‘a man unconstant, false, and double-minded, by the report of all men.’
June 14.
Oct. 11.
The Lanarkshire lead-mines, under the care of Thomas Foulis, goldsmith in Edinburgh, and Bewis Bulmer, an Englishman, whom Thomas had assumed as partner, were now beginning to be a source of profit. The lead was transported on the backs of horses to sundry parts of the realm, but the greater part of it to Leith, where it was disposed of for exportation. Just, however, as all the mining difficulties had been overcome, the enterprisers found troubles of a different kind. The broken men of the Borders had heard of this valuable metal passing along the uplands of Clydesdale, and it seemed to them not too hazardous an adventure to cross the hills, and make a dash at such a booty. We therefore now hear of the carriers of the lead, servants of Thomas Foulis, being occasionally beset on their way, and robbed by the borderers of ‘horses, armour, clothing, and their haill carriage.’ Nearer neighbours, too, respectable men, burgesses of Lanark and Glasgow, were accused of lawlessly helping themselves to the lead and lead ore, won from the mines in Crawford Muir, not scrupling for this purpose to seize it in its passage to Leith, and dispose of it for their own benefit. Nay, these persons, it was said, had appropriated two horse-load of rye and white bread on its way to the mines, and within six miles of them, thus seriously hindering the progress of the work itself.
The Council issued a threatening proclamation against the first class of spoliators. As the latter set represented themselves as having lawfully purchased the lead in question, an order was issued that they should return or pay for it to Thomas Foulis.—P. C. R.
1597. June.
Owing to the fame of Andrew Melville, the university of St Andrews was this year attended by a considerable number of foreign youth, Poles, Danes, Belgians, and Frenchmen: ‘whilk crabbit the king mickle,’ Andrew being no favourite of his.—Ja. Mel.
‘Much about this time, there was a great number of witches tried to be in Scotland, as the like was never heard tell of in this realm, specially in Athole, both of men and women. There was in May at ane convention upon a hill in Athole, to the number of twenty-three hundred, and the devil amongst them. A great witch of Balwery told all this, and said she knew them all well enough, and what mark the devil had given severally to every one of them. There was many of them tried by swimming in the water, by binding of their two thumbs and their great toes together, for, being thus casten in the water, they floated ay aboon.’—Pa. And.
This ‘great witch of Balwery’ was one Margaret Aiken, who, being tortured on suspicion, not only confessed her guilt, but, for the saving of her own life, informed upon others, stating that they had a secret mark in their eyes, by which she could at once tell that they were witches. For three or four months, she was carried about the country detecting witches. At Glasgow, owing to the credulity of the minister John Cowper, several old women suffered in consequence of her accusations. In time it was found that she was a deceiver; for the same persons whom one day she declared to be guilty, she would next day, when they appeared before her in different clothes, affirm to be innocent. ‘At her trial, she affirmed all to be false that she had confessed, either of herself or others, and persisted in this till her death; which made many forthink their too great forwardness that way, and moved the king to recall the commissions given out against such persons.’—Spot.
In November we find the presbytery of Glasgow taking notice of ‘divers persons wha traduces and slanders the ministry of the city, as the authors of putting to death the persons lately execute for witchcraft;’ and it ordains that any person hereafter uttering this slander ‘shall be put in the branks at the judges’ will.’[229]
1597.
As a natural consequence of the deceptions of Margaret Aiken, there was now in some quarters an apprehension that, in the late proceedings against witches throughout the provinces, some injustice had been done. Some had complained ‘that grit danger may ensue to honest and famous persons, gif commissions grantit to particular men beiring particulars [that is, having anger] again’ them, sall stand and be authorised.’ The king professed to see the reality of this danger, and although it was his purpose to persevere in his efforts to extirpate that ‘maist odious and abominable crime,’ the Council (August 12) revoked all the lately granted commissions, certifying to such as hereafter ‘proceeds to the execution of persons to the deid, or melling with their guids or geir, that the same sall be repute slauchter upon forethocht, felony, and spulyie.’
At this time, the enthusiastic section of the church was in a state of discouragement; otherwise the king might not have been able to concede to the representations made to him against witch-commissions. It is too remarkable to be overlooked, that the heat of persecution against these unfortunates was generally in some proportion to the influence of the more zealous clergy, either through their direct agency or through the fear for their reproaches in others.
July 23.
‘Between eight and nine in the morning, there was an earthquake which made all the north parts of Scotland to tremble; Kintail, Ross, Cromarty, Mar, Breadalbane, &c. A man in St Johnston [Perth] laying compts with his compters, the compts lap off the buird; the man’s thighs trembled; one leg went up, and another down.’—Cal.
This earthquake happening at the time when King James ‘interrupted Mr Robert Wallace and undid the ministry of St Andrews,’ James Melville likens it to that which God sent to punish Uzziah, king of Judah, for usurping the priestly office—which rent the Temple of Jerusalem, and caused a beam to hurt the king in the face, the beginning of a leprosy with which he was afflicted. He adds what he calls a Dix-huitaine on the subject, concluding in the following strain:
‘King James the Saxt, this year thou fast aspires
O’er Christ his kirk to compass thy desires.
Oh, weigh this weel, and here exemple tak;
Lest Christ, wha this year shook thy north-wast parts,
And with eclipsed sun amazed the hearts
For kings to come thee just exemple mak.’
Aug. 6. 1597.
‘The pest began in Leith’ (Bir.), and soon ‘infected sundry parts about Edinburgh, so that many fled out of the town.’—Cal. It raged during this year in England, 17,890 persons being carried off in London alone. A fast was held in Edinburgh on account of this visit of the pestilence, from the 7th of August till the end of harvest, when it ceased. Notwithstanding the scarcity of food from October 1595 down almost to this time, the mortality in Scotland does not appear to have been great—a result probably owing in the main part to the abundant harvest of the present year.
Aug. 27.
‘Ane trouble betwixt certain servants of the Drummonds and Oliver Young, then one of the bailies of Perth, within the Hie Gait [High Street] of the said burgh; when the greatest number of the pursuers leapt the town’s walls, and so few number of them as escapit came to the Tolbooth. The agreement was made in the South Inch, the 1st of September thereafter.’—Chron. Perth.
Nov. 3.
‘The Earl of Cassillis marries Dame Jean Fleming, wha was wife to the last chancellor [Lord Thirlstane], ane very unmeet match, for she was past bairns-bearing, and he was ane young man not past twenty-three years or thereby, and his lands unheired. The king and court mockit the same marriage, and made sonnets in their contempt; and specially his majesty took his pastime of that sport.’—C. K. Sc.
Nov. 7.
‘... it pleased God to tak the Laird of Bargeny in his mercy; wha was the nobillest man that ever was in that country [Carrick] in his time. He was endued with mony guid virtues. First he fearit God, and was fra the beginning on the right side of religion. He was wise and courteous, and therewith stout and passing kind; and sic ane noble spender in outings with the best-halden house at hame that ever was in the land. He was never behind with na party, and keepit himself ever to the fore with his living. He had ever in his household twenty-four gallant gentlemen, double-horsit, and gallantly clad; with sic ane repair to his house, that it was ane wonder where the same was gotten that he spendit.’—Ken.
Nov. 1597.
While so much lawless violence prevailed throughout the country at large, it was not to be expected that the Borders should be quiet. In truth, the greatest disorders prevailed in that district, particularly in the west, where certain broken clans—Armstrongs, Johnstons, Bells, Batisons, Carlyles, and Irvings—lived in a great measure by robbing and oppressing their neighbours. Occasionally, too, they would make predatory incursions into England, and thereby endanger the peace existing between the two realms. The king was at length roused to make a vigorous effort for the repression of this system of violence. He came at the beginning of this month to Dumfries, ‘of resolution not to return therefra till that turn was effectuate, as indeed his majesty did meikle to it.’—Moy. In the course of four weeks, which he spent in the town, ‘he hangit fourteen or fifteen limmers and notorious thieves.’ From every branch of the guilty clans, he took one or two of the principal men, ‘as pledges that the haill stouths and reifs committed by them, or any of their particular branch, should be redressed, and that they and all theirs should abstene from sic insolency in time coming, under pain of hanging.’[230]
For the reception of such persons in general, there was a pledge-chalmer—a sort of honourable jail, we presume—in Dumfries. On this occasion, however, the pledges, thirty-six in number, were distributed over his majesty’s houses, where it was ordained they should each pay 13s. 4d. weekly for their maintenance.
The arrangement for the Court of Redress at Dumfries was in characteristic terms. It was to be composed of ‘aucht special honest gentlemen of the country, least suspect, maist neutral and indifferent, and the best inclined to justice,’ with ‘twa or three of his majesty’s council appointit to be present with them.’—P. C. R.
Lord Ochiltree, whom the king appointed as warden of the west Border, ‘remainit five or six months at Dumfries, halding courts of redress, and pacifying the country. He hangit and slew three score, with the more notable thieves ... and kept the country in great quietness and guid order all this time.’—Moy.
There is a small silver toy at Dumfries, in the form of a fusee or musket, which King James is represented as having gifted to the Seven Incorporated Trades in 1598, that it might be the prize of an annual shooting-match. ‘The siller gun,’ as it is called, has till recent times accordingly been carried by the trades in procession to a shooting-field near the town, whence the victor used to bring it home stuck in his hat. Most probably, it was while spending this month in Dumfries, and not during 1598 (when he certainly did not visit the town), that he conferred this mark of his favour.
Dec. 7. 1597.
A homicide committed at this time brings out a remarkable illustration of the exclusive rule of master over man which then prevailed. On the first day of the sitting of parliament, Archibald Jardine, servitor and master-stabler to the Earl of Angus, was slain negligently by Andrew Stalker, goldsmith, at Niddry’s Wynd head. The said Andrew was apprehendit and put in prison. The young men of the town being all in arms, as they use to be in the time of the parliament, they came to his majesty, and desirit grace for the young man wha had done ane reckless deed. The king’s majesty desirit them to go to my Lord of Angus, the man’s master, and satisfy and pacify his wrath, and he should be contentit to grant his life. James Williamson, being captain to the young men, came to my Lord of Angus, offered him their manreid to be ready to serve him gif he had to do: upon the whilk, he grantit them his life, and sae the said Andrew was releasit out of prison upon the said day at even.’—Bir.
1597-8. Jan. 16.
‘Thomas Foulis conceivit sickness.’—Bir. One who knew nothing more of Thomas Foulis than what Birrel tells, might be surprised to find the simple fact of his becoming sick entered in this pointed way by the old diarist. As we have already had Thomas several times under our attention, and know him for a great goldsmith, banker, and speculator in mines, we can imagine his indisposition as a public fact of that degree of consequence that a diarist might well think worth chronicling. The truth is, King James had gone deeply into debt towards Thomas for goldsmith work and ready money advanced; his creditors were now pressing him, and he had nothing wherewith to satisfy them. The unhappy man consequently fell into a ‘phrensie.’ It would appear from one chronicler as if the king had not acted humanely towards his creditor under these circumstances. It is alleged that Thomas’s offices were taken from him, and he was obliged to surrender a certain jewel of note, called the H, which he had in pledge from the king[231] for the sum of twelve thousand pounds. But all this is scarcely in harmony with the fact that, in June next, one of the doings of a convention parliament was to arrange ‘that the debt awaud by his majesty to Thomas Foulis be payit in six years, namely, thirty thousand merks every year.’—Bir. Thomas was at the same time made master of the cunyie-house (mint).
1597-8.
It appears on the 28th May 1601, that the king owed ‘nine score thousand punds money’ to Thomas Foulis, goldsmith, Robert Jowsie, merchant-burgess of Edinburgh, and Thomas Acheson, master-cunyier, who were in consequence subject to infinite complaints from their creditors. His majesty professed ‘guid affection and desire to the payment thereof,’ and arranged that it should be discharged in the course of eleven years by a preferable power over the receipts of the royal rents. ‘His majesty als promittis to give to Thomas, his wife and bairns, during their lifetime successive after others, ane yearly pension of ane thousand punds money.’—P. C. R.
In December 1602, a piteous complaint was made before the Privy Council by Andrew Lockhart, regarding the hardship he underwent as a creditor of Thomas Foulis and Robert Jowsie, through the effect of a supersedere they had obtained for their debts. He speaks of having been, ‘with his wife and aucht bairns,’ reduced to misery, through the non-payment of what these men owed him, ‘he being ane aigit gentleman, and a brother of ane honourable house,’ The Council could not interfere, but engaged that when the present supersedere run out, which it would do erelong, no other should be granted.—P. C. R.
Feb. 8.
The impunity of numberless murders and other atrocious crimes in this reign is not more remarkable than the severity occasionally exhibited in comparatively trifling cases. For making a false writ in a matter of three hundred merks, five citizens of Edinburgh were condemned to death. Such, likewise, was the issue of the trial of John Moscrop, writer in Edinburgh, for giving himself out as a notary, and subscribing divers papers as such, he not being one. The six men appear to have all been tried on one day, and the end of the affair is chronicled by Birrel: ‘John Windieyetts, John Moscrop, Alexander Lowrie, John Halliday, and Captain James Lowrie [were] all hangit at the Cross of Edinburgh for counterfeiting false writs; whilk was great pity to see.’—Bir.
Feb. 16.
It was now five years since the tragic death of the Earl of Moray, and yet his corpse lay unburied. So also did that of the late Lord Maxwell, killed in a conflict with the Johnstons, in December 1593.
Stigmatising this as an abuse that ‘of late has croppin in,’ and in order to prevent the example from being followed, the king and Council issued an order to the respective relatives of the two noblemen, that they have the bodies buried in their ordinary places of sepulture within twenty days, under pain of rebellion.—P. C. R.
Feb. 25. 1597-8.
On this day, being Saturday, occurred an eclipse of the sun, total at Edinburgh, and probably so throughout the country generally. No event entirely similar had occurred within the memory of living people in Scotland, and the impression which it was naturally calculated to produce in an age when such things were regarded as prodigies, was aggravated by the critical state in which the favourite Presbyterian institutions were then believed to be placed. Men regarded it as the omen of a dark period for the Kirk of Scotland.[232]
‘Betwixt nine and ten forenoon,’ says Calderwood, ‘began a fearful eclipse, which continued about two hours. The whole face of the sun seemed to be covered and darkened about half a quarter of an hour, in such measure that none could see to read a book. The stars appeared in the firmament. Sea, land, and air was still, and stricken dead as it were. The ravens and fowls flocking together mourned exceedingly in their kind. Great multitudes of paddocks [frogs] ran together, making an uncouth and hideous noise; men and women were astonished, as if the day of judgment had been coming. Some women swooned. The streets of Edinburgh were full of cries. Some men ran off the streets to the kirk to pray.’
‘In the session-house or college of justice, no letter nor book could be read nor looked upon for the space of an hour for darkness, and yet in the north-east there appeared two stars. After this, the space of eight days fair weather [which] ensued, was admirable. But the day after, yea Friday and Saturday, there fell out the greatest rain that might be, in such a manner that neither plough nor harrow could gang a long time after.’—Pa. And.
‘I knew,’ says James Melville, ‘out of ephemeridis and almanack, the day and hour of it ... also, by natural philosophy, the causes. I set myself to mark the proceedings of it in a basin of water mixed with ink, thinking the matter but common. But yet, when it came to the extremity of darkness, and I myself losit all the sun, I was strucken with such fear and astonishment, that I had no refuge but to prostrate [myself] on my knees, and commend myself to God, and cry for mercy.’
1597-8.
‘The like fearful darkness was never seen in this land, so far as we can read in our histories, or understand from tradition. The wise and godliest thought it very prodigious, so that from pulpit and by writ, admonitions were given to the ministers, that the changeable and glittering show of the world go not in betwixt them and Christ, the Sun of Righteousness, and remove the clear light of the gospel from the kirk.’—Cal.
A Presbyterian diarist is careful to tell us the ‘notable effects of this eclipse’ in the year following; namely, the death of those famous ‘lights of the Kirk of Scotland, Mr Thomas Buchanan, Mr Robert Rollock, David Ferguson, &c.’—Ja. Mel.
1598. Mar.
‘... the Duke of Holstein, the queen’s brother, came through England to Edinburgh, and was conveyed the first night to the Palace of Holyroodhouse, where he was received and welcomed very gladly by her majesty, and used every way like a prince. His majesty hasted to Edinburgh to meet with the duke, and at his coming saluted and entertained him ... as appertained to his rank. The duke made a progress from Holyroodhouse to the other side of the Forth, the first night to Ravensheugh, Lord Sinclair’s house, and from thence to Balcomie, Pittenweem, Anstruther, St Andrews, Dundee, Foulis, Stirling, and Linlithgow, and returned again to Edinburgh. He was honourably received and banqueted all the way. His majesty gave him banquets in Holyroodhouse and Stirling sundry times, and entertained him with pastime, and all other things to his great liking and contentment; likewise he was very largely complimented by their majesties.’ That is, they gave him large presents.—Moy. R.
May 2. ‘The Duke of Holstein got ane banquet in Macmoran’s lodging,[233] given by the town of Edinburgh. The king’s majesty and the queen being both there, there was great solemnity and merriness at the said banquet.’—Bir.
June 3. ‘The Duke of Holstein took his leave of the king and queen, and shipped at Leith, having got great propines [gifts]; to wit, a thousand five-pound pieces, a thousand crowns, with a hat and a string valued at twelve thousand pounds, besides other rich chains and jewels.’—Pa. And. ‘To his bonalley, sixty shot of ordnance shot off the bulwark of Leith.’—Bir.
Apr. 1598.
Fynes Moryson, gentleman, who had travelled in most of the countries of Europe, being at Berwick, felt an earnest desire, before returning southwards, to see the king of Scots’ court. He therefore entered Scotland, and in one day rode to Edinburgh; after which he proceeded to Falkland, and designed to visit St Andrews and Stirling, but was prevented by unexpected business, which recalled him to England. He tells us little that is remarkable about the localities he visited, but makes some general observations regarding travelling in Scotland, which are not devoid of interest.
‘In Scotland,’ he says, ‘a horse may be hired for two shillings the first day, and eightpence the day till he be brought home; and the horse-letters used to send a footman to bring back the horse. They have no such inns as be in England; but in all places some houses are known where passengers may have meat and lodging; but they have no bushes or signs hung out, and for the horses, they are commonly set up in stables in some out-lane, not in the same house where the passenger lies. And if any man be acquainted with a townsman, he will go freely to his house, for most of them will entertain a stranger for his money. A horseman shall pay for oats and straw (for hay is rare in those parts) some eightpence day and night; and he shall pay no less in summer for grass, whereof they have no great store. Himself at a common table shall pay about sixpence for his supper or dinner, and shall have his bed free; and if he will eat alone in his chamber, he may have meat at a reasonable rate. Some twenty or thirty years ago, the first use of coaches came into Scotland; yea, were they rare even at Edinburgh. At this day, since the kingdoms of England and Scotland were united, many Scots have been promoted by the king’s favour both in dignity and estate, and the use of coaches became more frequent, yet nothing so common as in England. But the use of horse-litters hath been very ancient in Scotland, as in England, for sickly men and women of quality.’
1598.
He tells that the Scotch eat much colewort and cabbage, and little fresh meat. ‘Myself,’ he says, ‘was at a knight’s house, who had many servants to attend him, that brought in his meat with their heads covered with blue caps, the table being more than half furnished with great platters of porridge, each having a little piece of sodden meat. And when the table was served, the servants did sit down with us; but the upper mess [those sitting above the salt-vat], instead of porridge, had a pullet with some prunes in the broth. And I observed no art of cookery or furniture of household stuff, but rather rude neglect of both, though myself and companion, sent from the governor of Berwick about Border affairs, were entertained after their best manner.... They vulgarly eat hearth-cakes of oats [girdles for toasting the cakes over a fire were subsequently invented at Culross], but in cities have also wheaten bread, which for the most part was bought by courtiers, gentlemen, and the best sort of citizens.... They drink pure wines, not with sugar, as the English; yet at feasts they put comfits in the wine, after the French manner; but they had not our vintners’ fraud, to mix the wines....’
‘Their bedsteads were then like cupboards in the wall, with doors to be opened and shut at pleasure; so we climbed up to our beds. They used but one sheet, open at the sides and top, but close at the feet, and so doubled [still practised, and a comfortable custom it is].... When passengers go to bed, their custom was to present them with a sleeping-cup of wine at parting.’
‘The husbandmen, the servants, and almost all in the country, did wear coarse cloth made at home, of gray or sky colour [hodden gray], and flat blue caps very broad. The merchants in cities were attired in English or French cloth, of pale colour or mingled black and blue. The gentlemen did wear English cloth, or silk, or light stuffs, little or nothing adorned with silk lace, much less with lace of silver or gold, and all followed at this time the French fashion, especially in court. Gentlewomen married did wear close upper bodies, after the German manner, with large whalebone sleeves, after the French manner, short cloaks like the Germans, French hoods, and large falling bands round their necks. The unmarried of all sorts did go bareheaded, and wear short cloaks, with most close linen sleeves on their arms, like the virgins of Germany. The inferior sort of citizens’ wives, and the women of the country, did wear cloaks made of a coarse stuff, of two or three colours in chequer-work, vulgarly called plodan.’[234]
May.
1598.
‘... Lord Home came to Lauder, [and] asked for William Lauder [bailie of that burgh, commonly called William at the West Port], being the man who hurt John Cranston (nicknamed John with the gilt sword). [William] fled to the tolbooth, as being the strongest and surest house, for his relief. But the Lord Home caused put fire to the house, and burnt it all. The gentleman remained therein till the roof-tree fell. In end he came desperately out amongst them, and hazard[ed] a shot of a pistol at John Cranston, and hurt him. But [it] being impossible to escape with life, they most cruelly without mercy hacked him with swords and whingers all in pieces.’—Pa. And.
Lady Marischal, sister of Lord Home, ‘hearing the certainty of the cruel murder of William Lauder, did mightily rejoice thereat, and writ it for good news to sundry of her friends in the country. But within less than twenty-four hours after, the lady took a swelling in her throat, both without and within, after a great laughter, and could not be cured till death seized upon her with great repentance.’[235]—Pa. And.
A remission for this barbarous slaughter was granted by the king, in 1606, to the Earl of Home, Hume of Hutton Hall, Thomas Tyrie, tutor of Drumkilbo, John Hume in Kells, and other persons.[236]
June 5.
It does not appear that any effectual order was taken with the Laird of Johnston for his resistance to the royal authority at Dryfe’s Sands and the slaughter of Lord Maxwell (December 6, 1593). His turbulent proceedings at length caused him to be denounced as a rebel. A few days before this event, his portrait was hung, head downwards, on the gibbet at the Cross of Edinburgh, and he declared ‘a mansworn man.’—Bir. He was restored to his honours in 1600.
June 22.
The king gave a letter of patent to Archibald Napier, apparent of Merchiston, for an invention of his, a ‘new order of gooding and manuring of field-land with common salt, whereby the same may bring forth in more abundance, both of grass and corn of all sorts, and far cheaper than by the common way of dunging used heretofore in Scotland.’ That nothing came of this plan need not be told.
1598.
The Merchiston Napiers must have been a theme of some curiosity and no little remark at this time, seeing that three generations were now living, all of them busy-brained, ingenious, and original-minded persons. First was the laird himself, master-general of the cunyie-house, still in the vigour of life, being not more than sixty-five years of age. Second was John Napier, the fiar or heir, only sixteen years the junior of his father, constantly engaged in puzzling out profound problems in mathematics and prophecies in the Apocalypse. Finally, this grandson of the laird, a youth of four-and-twenty, and already, as we see, exhibiting the active intellect of the family.
Archibald became a favourite courtier of James VI. and Charles I., by the latter of whom he was raised to the peerage. He joined the anti-covenanting party, and endured some adversity in his latter days.
The carboniferous formation, as is well known, does not extend in Scotland beyond the Ochils; but in the remote county of Sutherland, on the coast at Brora, there is a patch of oolite, in the lower section of which is a workable bed of coal, between three and four feet thick. John, tenth Earl of Sutherland, had discovered this valuable deposit, but being cut off by poison (anno 1567), he had no opportunity of trying to turn it to advantage. The Sutherland estates were now under the management of a woman of some force of character, and who has by accident a place in our national history—Lady Jean Gordon. Being divorced by Bothwell, in order to admit of his marriage to Queen Mary, she had subsequently married one Earl of Sutherland, and become the mother of another, for whom she was now acting. By this clever countess the coal of Brora was for the first time worked, not merely for its use in domestic purposes, but as a means of establishing a salt-work. Some pans being erected by her ‘a little by-west the entry of the river,’ there was good salt made there, ‘which served not only Sutherland and the neighbouring provinces, but also was transported into England and elsewhere.’ This was a good effort, but, like all similar enterprises in that rude age, it met with interruptions. One vigorous renewed effort was made by the countess’s son, Earl John, in 1614. It was not, however, till our own time, when the first Duke of Sutherland spent £16,000 on the coal-works, and £2337 on the salt-works, that the original designs of Countess Jean could be said to be fully realised. The works are stated to have given forth twenty thousand tons of coal between the years 1814 and 1826.[237]
July 10.
1598.
‘... ane man, some callit him a juggler, playit sic supple tricks upon ane tow, whilk was fastenit betwixt the top of St Giles’s Kirk steeple and ane stair beneath the Cross, callit Josia’s Close head, the like was never seen in this country, as he rade down the tow and playit sae mony pavies on it.’—Bir.
Practitioners of such dangerous arts were not uncommon in those days. The death, in Edinburgh, of one Kirkaldy, ‘who had before danced at the cock of the steeple [St Giles’s],’ is noted in the history of the civil broils of 1571.[238]
Mr James Melville reports in 1600: ‘Being in Falkland, I saw a funambulus, a Frenchman, play strange and incredible proticks upon stented tackle in the palace close before the king, queen, and haill court.’ He adds the vulgar surmise of the day: ‘This was politickly done, to mitigate the queen and people for Gowrie’s slaughter.’
It appears that these diverting vagabonds were well rewarded. The juggler of 1598, called an ‘English sporter,’ had twenty pounds from the king for the steeple-trick. Two months after, six pounds thirteen shillings and fourpence was ordered to ‘David Weir, sporter,’ supposed to be the same person. To Peter Bramhill, the French pavier—that is, player of pavies—there is a precept from his majesty, ordering him no less a sum than £333, 6s. 8d.[239]—but of course Scottish money.
‘This year the wheat was blasted.’—Chron. Perth. ‘The ait meal sold for 6s. the peck.’—Bir.
There was, consequently, towards the end of the year, ‘ane extraordinar dearth of all kinds of pultrie and other vivres,’ throughout the realm, but particularly did this kind of scarcity prevail in Edinburgh, ‘where his hieness, his nobility and council, in sundry seasons of the year, make their chief residence.’ The king issued a proclamation, fixing a minimum of prices for the said articles, not to be exceeded under certain penalties. This, however, was now found ‘likely to become altogether ineffectual, partly through the avaritious greediness of some persons wha forestalls and buys the pultrie in grit, and keeps the same in secret houses, and there sells the same far above the prices exprest in the proclamation,’ and partly by the negligence of magistrates, who take no care to punish ‘the authors of this disorder.’ For these reasons, a more rigorous and menacing proclamation was now made.
1598.
A fortnight after, followed an edict of Council against twenty-four poultrymen of Edinburgh (surprising there should have then been so many in the business), who, it was said, had contravened the late proclamation by forestalling and secretly selling their poultry at high prices, representing the fowls as ‘his majesty’s awn kain fowls, or that they are bocht by them for his majesty’s awn mouth ... slanderand his majesty hereby, as if his majesty were the chief cause of the break of the said proclamation.’
It is amusing to observe the apparent astonishment of the king and his councillors on finding how little respect was paid to edicts of this kind, as if it were a most unrighteous and undutiful thing of the people to try to get prices for articles proportionate to the small quantity there was to sell. We must not, however, be too ready to indulge in a smile at the false political economy of the Scottish monarch of 1598, when we remember that a law-made scarcity of vivres was kept up in Great Britain till 1846, and observe that at the present day the sovereign of France still dictates the prices at which beef and mutton are to be sold in Paris. At the very time when this notice is penned (September 1856), the newspapers describe the conduct of butchers in Paris as precisely that of the twenty-four poultrymen of Edinburgh in 1599; that is to say, they sell their meat in secret to persons who will give suitable prices.
Considering the scarcity which marked the close of 1598, it is not surprising to find the Chronicle of Perth adverting next year to ‘ane great deid among the people.’
Dec.
The Privy Council Record at this date gives an anecdote which reads like a tale of patriarchal times—the time when Jacob told his sons to go down into Egypt and buy corn, ‘that we may live and not die.’
1598.
On some recent occasion of pestilence, Dumfries, being specially and severely afflicted, was, as usual, sequestered from all intercourse and traffic—its markets became altogether decayed, and the inhabitants, in addition to all their other distresses, found themselves ‘evil handlit for want of necessar sustentation.’ In these circumstances, it seemed good to them to send two of their number, unsuspected of infection, to the country about the Water of Cree in Galloway, to purchase cattle. The two men, James Sharpe and John Mertine, set forth on this quest, and, coming to the burgh of Wigtown, were there well received by the magistrates, who seemed willing to give them Christian help and countenance for their object, on the condition that the cattle were paid for and the burgh of Wigtown satisfied in their customs. Thus sanctioned, the Dumfries emissaries went into the country and bought thirty-eight nolt, which they began to drive towards Dumfries, looking for no interruption or impediment. At Monygaff on the Water of Cree, they were met by a large armed party under the command of Patrick Ahannay, provost of Wigtown, and John Edgar and Archibald Tailfer, bailies, who laid violent hands upon them, and carried them and their cattle to Wigtown. We do not learn what was the motive of this conduct, but may reasonably surmise it was some claim in the way of custom which the Dumfriessians had failed to satisfy. At Wigtown the cattle were detained eight days, getting gradually leaner for want of food, till at last they were ‘extreme lean;’ and it was not till their owners had paid a hundred merks, that they were allowed to proceed with the beeves to the starving burgh of Dumfries.
This pitiable affair, which reads so strangely of Dumfries, now the scene of magnificent markets for the transfer of cattle, came under the notice of the Privy Council, and was remitted to the ordinary judges to be settled by them as they might think best.—P. C. R.
1598-9. Jan. 19.
Thomas Lorn, residing at Overton of Dyce, was brought before the provost of Aberdeen, accused of ‘hearing of spreits, and wavering ofttimes frae his wife, bairns, and family, by the space of seven weeks,’ they not knowing ‘where he has been during the said space.’ He agreed that, if he should ever be found absenting himself in that manner, without giving warning, he should suffer death ‘as ane guilty person, dealer with spreits.’—Ab. C. R.
1599. July 26.
Andrew Melville, of whose courage and zeal for pure presbytery Scottish history is at this time full, presided at a disputation in the theological hall of St Mary’s College, St Andrews, where the question was, ‘Whether by divining or diabolical force of witches and hags, bodies may be transported or transformed, or souls released for a time from bodies, and whether this transportation or transformation of bodies, or resemblance of a projected corpse, without sense and motion, as if the soul were banished, be a simple lethargy, or a certain evidence of execrable demonomania?‘[240]
1599.
If the reader be at a loss to conceive how any body of learned men could gravely treat such a question, he may have the fact verified to his mind by looking into King James’s book on Demonologie, where the same matter is fully debated between Philomathes and Epistemon, the two interlocutors in the dialogue of which that treatise consists. In answer to the question of Philomathes, by what means may it be possible for witches to come to those conventions where they worship the devil and receive his orders, Epistemon coolly says: ‘One way is natural, which is natural riding, going, or sailing: this may be easily believed. Another way is somewhat more strange ... being carried by the force of the spirit which is their conductor, either above the earth or above the sea swiftly, to the place where they meet; which I am persuaded to be likewise possible, in respect that as Habakkuk was carried by the angel in that form to the den where Daniel lay, so think I, the devil will be ready to imitate God as well in that as in other things.... The third way is that wherein I think them deluded: for some of them say that, being transported in the likeness of a little beast or fowl, they will come and pierce through whatsoever house or church, though all passages be closed, by whatsoever open the air may enter in at: and some say, that their bodies lying still, as in an ecstasy, their spirits will be ravished out of their bodies and carried to such places; and, for verifying thereof, will give evident tokens, as well by witnesses that have seen their body lying senseless in the meantime, as by naming persons whom-with they met, and giving token what purpose was amongst them, whom otherwise they could not have known; for this form of journeying they affirm to use most, when they are transported from one country to another.’
Oct.
The reformed clergy did not at first take a decidedly hostile view of theatricals, and we have seen that even the Regent Moray allowed a play to be represented before him. In March 1574, the General Assembly forbade the playing of ‘clerk plays,’ and ‘comedies and tragedies made of the canonical scriptures’ both on Sabbath and work-days; but as to ‘comedies, tragedies, and other profane plays not made upon authentic parts of scripture,’ they were willing that such might be considered before they be proposed publicly, provided they were to be set forth on work-days only.—B. U. K.
1599.
Accordingly, it is not surprising that, when a company of comedians came to Perth in June 1589, and applied to the kirk-session for a licence to represent a play, of which they produced a copy, that reverend court expressed itself as follows: ‘Perth, June 3, 1589.—The minister and elders give licence to play the play, with conditions that no swearing, banning, nor nae scurrility shall be spoken, whilk would be a scandal to our religion, and for an evil example to others. Also, that nothing shall be added to what is in the register of the play itself. If any one who plays shall do in the contrary, he shall be wardit, and make his public repentance.’—P. K. S. R.
These are among the proofs to the general conclusion, that the puritanic strictness for which Scotland has been noted, did not reach its acme during the first age succeeding the Reformation.
Ten years had since elapsed, during which the English drama had passed through a vigorous adolescence, drawing the highest wits of the land into its service. No regular theatre had been set up in Scotland, nor was the time come when one could be supported; but some inclination was manifested by the London acting companies to pay occasional visits to the north, where the mirth-loving king and his court were ready to patronise them. The clergy were by this time disposed to look more sourly on the children of Thespis. An English company did come to Edinburgh about October 1599—possibly the Blackfriars company, to which Shakspeare belonged; but on this point, and as to the question whether Shakspeare was of the party, we have no information. It received a licence from the king to perform.
Nov. 10.
1599.
Roused by ‘certain malicious and restless bodies, wha upon every little occasion misconstrue his majesty’s haill doings,’ the general kirk-session of the city passed an act in direct opposition to the purport of the royal licence, threatening with censure all who should support the comedy; and this they ordered to be read in all pulpits, where, at the same time, the ‘unruly and immodest behaviour of the stage-players’ became the theme of abundant declamation. The king chose to take up this act as a discharge of his licence, and called the sessions before him, when, after a conference, they professed to be convinced that ‘his hieness had not commandit nor allowit ony thing carrying with it ony offence or slander;’ and they readily agreed to annul their former act. This was accordingly done next day, ‘sae that now not only may the comedians freely enjoy the benefit of his majesty’s liberty and warrant grantit to them, but all his majesty’s subjects, inhabitants within the said burgh, and others whatsomever, may freely at their awn pleasure repair to the said comedies and plays, without ony pain, reproach, censure, or slander to be incurrit by them.’—P. C. R.
We learn, however, from Spottiswoode, that this was ‘to the great offence of the ministers.’
Oct.
The Western Isles being a scene of almost incessant private war and strife, and the crown-rents remaining unpaid, the king became desirous to reduce that part of his dominions to obedience and the arts of peace. It was thought that a plantation of industrious Lowlanders might prove an effectual means of civilising the district. As a preliminary step, an act of parliament was passed (June 1598) for depriving of their lands all who should not shew their titles by a particular day—a most arbitrary measure, which to some extent the turbulent chieftains were justified in resisting. In this manner the islands of Lewis and Harris, the lands of Dunvegan in Skye, and of Glenelg on the mainland, were declared to be at the disposal of the government. It was resolved to proceed, in the first place, with the planting of the Lewis, where there were only two illegitimate sons of the late proprietor to give any opposition.
Accordingly, a set of gentlemen, chiefly belonging to Fife, associated themselves together as adventurers; namely, the Duke of Lennox; Patrick, Commendator of Lindores; William, Commendator of Pittenweem; Sir James Anstruther, younger of that Ilk; Sir James Sandilands of Slamanno; James Learmont of Balcomie; James Spens of Wormiston; John Forret of Fingask; David Home, younger of Wedderburn; and Captain William Murray. By the terms of a contract between these individuals and the government, they were, in consideration of the great expenses to be incurred by them, and the improvements which they were expected to make, freed from any payment of rent for the lands which they were to occupy, for seven years. At the end of that time, an annual grain-rent of one hundred and forty chalders of beir was to commence.[241]
1599.
In October 1599, ‘the adventurers met altogether in Fife, where they assembled a company of soldiers, and artificers of all sorts, with everything which they thought requisite for a plantation. So, transporting themselves into the Lewis, they began apace to build and erect houses in a proper and convenient place fit for the purpose. In the end, they made up a pretty town, where they encamped. Niel Macleod and Murdo Macleod—now only left in that island of all Rorie Macleod his children—withstood the undertakers. Murdo Macleod invaded the Laird of Balcomie, whom he apprehended with his ship [near the Orkneys], and killed all his men: so, having detained him six months in captivity within the Lewis, he released him, upon promise of a ransom. But Balcomie died in his return homeward to Fife,[242] after his releasement, whereby Murdo Macleod was disappointed of his ransom.’—G. H. S.
The two brothers soon after quarrelled, and Niel took Murdo prisoner. The enterprisers entered into an agreement with him for the delivery of Murdo to themselves, promising him, in requital, a portion of their lands. Niel consequently obtained a pardon at Edinburgh, while Murdo was hanged at St Andrews, confessing that the Lord of Kintail, the ambitious chief of the Mackenzies, had been the instigator of his brother and himself in their opposition to the plantation, the fact being, that Kintail desired to obtain the Lewis himself.
The truth of this appeared when the Lord of Kintail soon after set at liberty Tormod Macleod, legitimate son of the late proprietor, who immediately proceeded to raise a new war against the undertakers. Niel joining him, they attacked the settlement, which they destroyed, killed most of the people, and took the commanders prisoners. These gentlemen were only released eight months after, on a promise that they should abandon the island, and never return; besides which, they undertook to procure a pardon from the king for their conquerors.
Thus ended, for a time, the attempt to plant the Lewis.
Dec. 17.
1599.
Till this time, the new year legally held in Scotland was that originally pitched upon by Exiguus when he introduced the Christian era—namely, the 25th of March, or day of the Annunciation. King James, probably looking upon the approaching year 1600 as the beginning of a new century, thought it would be a good occasion for bringing Scotland into a conformity with other countries in respect of New-year’s Day. There was therefore passed this day at Holyrood an act of Privy Council, in which it is set forth that ‘in all other weel-governit commonwealths and countries, the year begins yearly upon the first of January, commonly called New-year’s Day, and that this realm only is different frae all others in the count and reckoning of the years;’ for which reason they ordained that, in all time coming, Scotland shall conform to this usage, and that the next first of January shall be the first day of the year of God 1600.
Dec. 27.
A singular combat being intended betwixt Alexander Livingstone of Pantaskin and John Kennedy, appeirand of Baltersand, without any warrant from his majesty, the Privy Council denounced and prohibited the encounter as contrary to law, and ‘not likely to settle the trouble whereupon the challenge proceeded and procure peace to baith parties.’—P. C. R.
On the 1st of April 1600, there was a strong edict for the execution of the laws against single combats, which were said, through slackness of the law, to have become frequent.
During this year ‘there were divers incursions in the Highlands and Borders, and sundry slaughters committed in divers parts of the country. Five sundry men were slain in one week within two miles of Edinburgh.’—Cal.
Circa 1599.
M’Alexander of Drumachryne in Ayrshire had a lease of the teinds of his estate from the Laird of Girvanmains, who in his turn was head-tenant of these teinds from the Earl of Cassillis. ‘But this Drumachryne, being ane proud man, wald now be tenant to my lord himself, and his man. [That is, he preferred being man or vassal to the earl.] The Laird of Girvanmains came to my lord, and said his lordship “had [done him wrang] in setting of his teinds to his awn man ower his head; and for ony gains he sall reap by that deed, the same sall be but small.” My lord answerit and said: “Ye dar not find fault with him; for, an ye do, we knaw whare ye dwell.” The other said: “An he bide by that deed, he should repent the same, do for him wha likit!” My lord said: “Ye dar not steir him for your craig [neck]!” and bade him gang to his yett [gate]. The Laird of Girvanmains rides his ways, and thinking that the Laird of Drumachryne wald come after him, he stayit, and his twa servants with him, on a muir called Craigdow, behind ane knowe [knoll], while that he saw him coming. His brother, the Laird of Corseclays, being with him, and Oliver Kennedy of ... ; but they strake never ane strake in his defence. Girvanmains pursues him, and his twa men with him, callit Gilbert M‘Fiddes and William M‘Fiddes, ane boy, wha was the spy. They come to them on horseback, and strake him on the head with swords, and slew him. My lord was very far offendit at this deed, and avowit to have ane mends thereof, and causit denounce Girvanmains to the horn; and did all he could to have his life, and wrack him in his geir.’—Hist. Ken.
A less tragical, but equally characteristic affair occurred in the same district about the same period. Let it first be understood that Kennedy of Bargeny and the Earl of Cassillis had long been on hostile terms.
Circa 1599.
‘My lord, having ane decreet against ane servant, of the Laird of Bargeny’s, callit John M‘Alexander, of the lands of Dangart ... wald put the same in execution, and intromit with the haill corns that was upon the grund; and send his household servants, and gart [caused] intromit with some of the corns, and shore ane part thereof. This coming to the Laird of Bargeny’s ears, he loups on in Ardstinchar, and rides to the land, and with horse and carts brought the corns that they had shorn with him to Ardstinchar; for, he said: “My lord had nae richt to the corns, albeit he had obteenit decreet against the land.” This being on the Saturday, my lord provides with all his force he can, against Monday, to shear the rest of the corns. And the Laird of Bargeny, in the same manner, provides for the same effect. The Laird of Bargeny, [being] the nearest hand, comes first to the grund, and to the number of six hundred men on horse, with twa hundred hagbutters. And my Lord of Ochiltree came also, with the number of ane hunder horse; so that, in all, he was, or [ere] twelve hours, the number of nine hunder men, on foot and horse. My Lord of Cassillis come also, with his haill force that he might mak, to the like number or few mae [more]. But the Laird, being in the house and yards, and he having many basses and hagbuts of found with him, the same was onpossible for my lord to mend himself. But my Lord of Cathcart, being ane nobleman wha had married to his wife ane near kinswoman of my Lord Cassillis, and his son having married the Laird of Bargeny’s sister, travelled amang them, and took up the matter in this sort, that the laird should have the haill corns that was on the grund to his servant, and should find caution for the duty of the land, whilk was my lord’s; and that my lord should come to the grund of the lands, and, according to his decreet, tak possession of the same, but not to steir the corns; and the Laird of Carleton and the Gudeman of Ardmillan to be cautioners for the foresaid duty, and my lord fand caution not to trouble the corns, nor the man in the shearing of them. And [according] to this agreeance, the laird rade his way to Ardstinchar; and my lord came to the land and took possession; and John M’Alexander shore his corns in peace.’—Hist. Ken.
1600. Jan.
There was a feid of old standing between the Lindsays of Forfarshire and the Lords Glammis; but for some years the parties were put under the restraint of letters of assurance. On a particular Sunday, during this month, Sir John Lindsay of Woodhead was passing along the High Street of Edinburgh, ‘gangand to the kirk,’ when he met Lord Glammis. The noble and gentle, ‘for the reverence they bure to his majesty and for observance of the assurance standing betwix them, past by other without provocation of offence or displeasure in word or countenance offerit by ony of them.’ As in the case of Montague and Capulet, however, the servants were not always to be restrained by the same feelings as the masters. After they were past, Patrick Johnston, a servant or tenant of Glammis, ‘drew his sword, invadit and pursewit the complenar [Lindsay] of his life, and strak and cuttit through the shoulder of his cloak, coat, and doublet, without the allowance of Lord Glammis, and thereby did what in him lay to have begun ane new feid and quarrel betwixt them, whilk wald not have faillit to have fallen out were not Lord Glammis himself and the complenar stayit it.’
Jan. 13.
Two days after, Lord Glammis appeared personally before the Privy Council, and ‘renouncit Patrick to be his man, tenant, or servant, sae that he sall not be repute, halden, nor esteemit to be his man, tenant, or servant hereafter;’ further avouching that ‘he sall quarrel nor beir grudge to nane that sall invade or pursue the said Patrick.’ The Council at the same time charged Patrick to compeir and answer for ‘his late violent and unhonest pursuit and invasion of Sir John Lindsay, without the consent, knowledge, or allowance of Patrick Lord Glammis, in whais company he was for the time, doing thereby what in him lay to have brocht on and protinued furder trouble and inconvenients betwixt the said Lord Glammis and the friends of the house of Crawford, to the break of his majesty’s peace and disquieting of the country.’—P. C. R.
An order to denounce Patrick as rebel for not appearing, was given on the 6th of March.
1600.
We receive in this notice a rich illustration of the relation of superior and ‘man’ in Scotland at the close of the sixteenth century. Johnston’s crime of assault is here touched upon lightly; what is pressed, is his committing this assault without the consent of his lord, and endangering a further quarrel between that lord and the assaulted man.
The affair appears to have had a sequel not less remarkable than itself. On Sunday the 6th of August 1601, as Patrick Johnston, designated as tenant of the Halltown of Belhelvies, was leaving the kirk of that parish, in time of the ministration of the sacrament of baptism, accompanied by his wife and two of his children, he was set upon, within two paces of the door, by Lord Glammis and a party of his lordship’s relatives and servants, and mercilessly slain with pistols and swords. We can scarcely doubt that this was the same Patrick who had incurred his superior’s anger by attacking Sir John Lindsay. A complaint against Lord Glammis and his ‘complices’ for the act was made before the presbytery of Aberdeen, by ‘the wife and aucht fatherless bairns’ of the slain man, and by that reverend court an effort was made, but in vain, to bring the matter to an arrangement in their favour. The guilty parties were cited for their crime before the Court of Justiciary in March 1602; but no punishment appears to have followed. Lord Glammis obtained a remission for his concern in Johnston’s slaughter, under the great seal. The ancient feudal ideas of Scotland were still too strong to allow of such a case being deemed one of common murder.[243] The fact did not prevent Lord Glammis from receiving advancement in court-favour and elevation in rank. He was made Earl of Kinghorn in 1606. It is also somewhat curious to reflect that to his taste and munificence we owe much of what is grand in the architecture of Glammis Castle.
Feb.
At this time arrived in Edinburgh the young Earl of Gowrie, and his brother, Alexander Ruthven, from Padua, where they had been studying for some years. To all appearance, they were disposed to be peaceable subjects of the king, notwithstanding the hard measure which had been dealt out to their father sixteen years before. When, some months afterwards, they came to so tragical an end, a circumstance, which occurred not long after their arrival in Edinburgh, was remembered, as betraying a state of mind different from what appeared on the surface of their general behaviour.
1600.
A certain Colonel Stuart of Houston, who, as commander of the royal guard, had been employed in seizing the late unfortunate Earl of Gowrie, was still employed at court. One day in June, as the young earl, accompanied with seven or eight of his servants, was passing along the long gallery of the palace, on his way to the king’s chamber, he observed Colonel Stuart come forth from an interview with his royal master. To avoid a too close meeting with one so painfully associated with his family history, he stepped aside a little, in order to let Stuart pass by. ‘The same being espied by ane of the said earl’s servants, going in the rank before him, callit Mr Thomas Kinrosser, [he] said ardently till him: “What, my lord, are you going back for ony man here? Come forward, my lord, bauldly!” Whilk going aside and then coming forward again, being seen by Colonel Stuart, he went in again to the king.
“Sir, it will please your majesty hear ane strange matter, that, for guid service done to your grace, I sould be so evil rewardit as I am. Here comes in the Earl of Gowrie, and I see he minds to begin first at me; but beware next of the best of you all.”
Herewith the said earl enterit in his majesty’s chalmer, and the colonel went out thereof; but there was nothing of that purpose spoken betwixt his majesty and the earl at that time. But, the colonel’s words to the king being reported to the earl, he answered: “Aquila non captat muscas.”‘—Jo. Hist.
Mar. 14.
The king, returning from a General Assembly in Edinburgh to his palace of Falkland, crossed the Firth of Forth by the ferry between Leith and Kirkcaldy. The weather was fair at starting, but became foul on the passage, and the mariners were obliged to run their boat upon the sands at Kirkcaldy, where the king was taken out on horseback. ‘He exclaimed with execration, that he was ever in danger of his life in going to those assemblies.’—Cal.
Apr. 2.
1600.
‘... being the Sabbath-day, Robert Auchmuty, barber, slew James Wauchope at the combat in St Leonard’s Hill, and upon the 23d, the said Robert [was] put in ward in the Tolbooth of Edinburgh. In the meantime of his being in ward, he hang ane cloak without the window of the iron house, and another within the window there, and, saying that he was sick, and might not see the light, he had aquafortis continually seething at the iron window, while [till] at the last the iron window was eaten through. Sae, upon a morning, he causit his prentice-boy attend when the town-guard should have dissolvit, at whilk time the boy waited on, and gave his master ane token that the said guard were gone, by the show or wave of his handcurch. The said Robert hung out ane tow whereon he thought to have come down. The said guard spied the wave of the handcurch, and sae the said Robert was disappointit of his intention and device; and sae, on the 10 day, he was beheadit at the Cross, upon ane scaffold.’—Bir.
May.
We possess the rental-sheet of the Marquis of Huntly for this date, and obtain from it a striking idea of the worldly means resting with that noble and potent lord. In the first place, the document extends over fifty-nine pages of print in small quarto, detailing the particulars of money and produce due from each farm on his lordship’s various estates—in the lordship of Huntly, the lordship of the Enzie, the lordship of Badenoch, the barony of Fochabers, the lands of Marr, the Cabrach, and Lochaber. The sum of ‘silver mail’ or money-rent is £3819, besides £636 of teind silver. The ‘ferm victual’ payable to his lordship was 3816 bolls, besides which there were 55 bolls of custom meal, 436 of multure beir, 108 of custom oats, 83 of custom victual, 167 marts (cattle for slaughter), 483 sheep, 316 lambs, 167 grice (young pigs), 14 swine, 1389 capons, 272 geese, 3231 poultry, 700 chickens, 5284 eggs, 4 stones of candle, 46 stones of brew tallow, 34 leats of peats, 990 ells of custom linen, 94 stones of custom butter, 40 barrels of salmon, 8 bolls of teind victual, 2 stones of cheese, and 30 kids. The large proportion of payment in kind speaks of a country in which there was little industry or commerce beyond what was connected with husbandry and store-farming; but it is easy to see what an amount of power the noble marquis would derive from possessing the means of feeding so many retainers.
1600.
In old times, so wealthy a lord was a kind of kinglet, owning, indeed, the superiority of a sovereign, but at the same time enjoying among minor lords and gentlemen a sway which barely owned a restraint in the royal authority. Men approaching him in influence were glad to form alliances with him, either through the ties of marriage, or by direct bonds of manred, in which they mutually agreed to support each other in all causes, against all living or dead, excepting only the king’s grace. Of such bonds, the Gordon charter-chest exhibits a grand series, extending from 1444, when James of Forbes ‘becomes man till ane honourable and mighty lord, Alexander of Seton of Gordon ... again all deadly,’ down to 1670, when Alexander Rose of Tillisnaucht, gave George, Marquis of Huntly, an engagement to live peaceably under his protection; being a hundred and seven in all. Even within the last seventeen years, during which the now existing marquis had been conducting his own affairs, the house had been receiving bonds of manred from a remarkable number of important men in the Highlands. The Earl of Argyle, in 1583, promised to ‘concur and take aefald, true, and plain part’ with the Gordon, ‘in all his honest and guid causes against whatsomever that live or die may, our sovereign lord and his authority alone excepted.’ Two years later, Macleod of Lewis receives promise of maintenance on the condition of obedience. At the same time, the chief of the Clan Kenzie, Colin of Kintail, enters into a bond of faithful service, ‘contrair all persons.’ His lordship received the like engagements from Monro of Foulis, the chieftain Glengarry, Macgregor of Glenstrae, and Drummond of Blair. In 1586, Kenneth Mackenzie of Kintail, Donald Robertson, the heir of Strowan, Donald Gorm of Sleat (progenitor of the present Lord Macdonald), John Grant of Freuchie, and the Lady Menzies of Weem, entered into similar undertakings. In 1587, Rattray of Craighall binds himself, with his dependents, ‘to serve the said earl in all his actions and adoes, against all persons, the king’s majesty only excepted, and sall neither hear nor see his skaith, but sall make him foreseen therewith, and sall resist the same sae far as in me lies, and that in respect the said earl has given me his band of maintenance.’ The remaining bonds before 1593 are from the Earl of Orkney, Menzies of Pitfoddles, Lord Lovat, Menzies of that Ilk, Scott of Abbotshall, the Laird of Melgund, Mackintosh of Dunnachtan, Innes of Innermarky, Lord Spynie, Cameron of Locheil, the Clan Macpherson, sundry barons of Moray, and the Laird of Luss. We may thus see what a formidable person this Earl of Huntly was to the Protestant interest in the year last named, and what a problem it must have been to the pacific King James to give him effectual opposition, however well he had been so inclined.[244]
1600.
The Marquis of Huntly chiefly dwelt in an ancient seat called Strathbogie Castle, situated where the rivulet Bogie joins the Doveran, near the village of Huntly, in Banffshire. He had another seat, called the Castle of the Bog or of Bogaugicht, on the extensive plain at the embouchure of the Spey, in the same county. The migrations of the family between the two places, and between them and a town-mansion in Aberdeen, are frequently alluded to by the annalist Spalding. In 1602, the marquis rebuilt Strathbogie Castle in a handsome style; and the remains of the house yet attest a grandness of living suitable to the wealth and political importance of the family. ‘A spacious turnpike-stair leads to what has been a very grand hall, and still bears the marks of splendour and magnificence. Its length is about forty-three feet, its breadth twenty-nine, and its height sixteen. There is another grand apartment over this, thirty-seven feet in length, and twenty-nine in breadth. The chimneys of both are highly ornamented with curious sculpture of various figures.... Most of the apartments are still in tolerable preservation, particularly the ceilings, which are ornamented with a great variety of paintings in small divisions, containing many emblematical figures, with verses expressive of some moral sentiment in doggerel rhyme.’[245]
July 2.
John Kincaid of Warriston, near Edinburgh, was married to a handsome young woman, named Jean Livingstone, daughter to a man of fortune and influence, the Laird of Dunipace. Owing to alleged maltreatment, the young wife conceived a deadly hatred of her husband. A base-minded nurse was near, to whisper means and ways of revenge, and the lady was induced to tamper with a young man named Robert Weir, a servant of her father, to become the instrument. At an early hour in the morning marginally noted, Weir came to Warriston, and, being admitted by the lady into the gentleman’s chamber, there fell upon him with his fists, and soon accomplished his death. While Weir fled, the lady remained at home, along with the nurse. Both were immediately seized, subjected to a summary kind of trial before the magistrates, and condemned to death.
1600.
In the brief interval between the sentence and execution, this unfortunate young creature—she was only twenty-one—was brought, by the discourse of an amiable clergyman, from a state of callous indifference to one of lively sensibility and religious resignation. Her case was reported in a small pamphlet of the day. She stated that, on Weir assaulting her husband, she went to the hall, and waited till the deed was done. She thought she still heard the pitiful cries uttered by her husband while struggling with his murderer. Afterwards, by way of dissembling, she tried to weep; but not a tear could she shed. She could only regard her approaching death as a just expiation of her offence. Her relations, feeling shamed by her guilt and its consequences, made interest to obtain that her execution should be as little public as possible, and it was accordingly arranged that, while the nurse was being burnt on the Castle Hill at four in the morning, and thus attracting the attention of any who might be out of their beds, the lady should be conducted to the Girth Cross, at the opposite extremity of the city, and there despatched by the Maiden.
According to the contemporary pamphlet: ‘The whole way, as she went to the place of execution, she behaved herself so cheerfully, as if she had been going to her wedding, and not to her death. When she came to the scaffold, and was carried up upon it, she looked up to the Maiden with two longsome looks, for she had never seen it before. This I may say of her, to which all that saw her will bear record, that her only countenance moved [her countenance alone would have excited emotion], although she had not spoken a word. For there appeared such majesty in her countenance and visage, and such a heavenly courage in her gesture, that many said: “That woman is ravished with a higher spirit than man or woman’s!”’ After reading a short address to the multitude at the four corners of the scaffold, she calmly resigned herself to her fate, uttering expressions of devotion till the descent of the axe cut short her speech.
Weir, being taken four years after, was broken on the wheel (June 26, 1604), a severe death, scarcely ever before inflicted in Scotland.—Pit. Bir.
July 21.
In Edinburgh, this day, ‘at nine hours at even, a combat or tulyie [was fought] between twa brether of the Dempsters, and ane of them slain by John Wilson. [He], being tane with het bluid, was execute at the flesh-stocks, where he had slain the man the night before.’—Bir.
July 25.
Quick as legal vengeance was in this instance, we have proof of its being of little avail for prevention of like outrages. Alexander Stewart, son of James Stewart of Allanton, had applied for admission to the king at Holyroodhouse, at a time ‘when his majesty desirit to be quiet,’ and Alexander Lockhart, one of the ushers of the chamber, had accordingly denied him admittance. The young man, conceiving deadly hatred at Lockhart for this, trained him out of his house unarmed, and there set upon him with sword and bended pistol to take his life. For a wonder, Lockhart escaped with only two wounds in the head. The guilty youth was denounced rebel for not answering for his offence.—P. C. R.
July.
1600.
The calamities of dearth, want, and a high mortality continued this year to press upon the people, in almost all parts of the country. ‘A sheaf of oat-straw was sold for forty shillings in Edinburgh. There was also a great death of little children; six or seven buried [in Edinburgh] in a day.’—Cal.
In October, the pest was in the town of Findhorn, in consequence of which there was an edict of the Privy Council, charging all the people there and thereabouts to keep at home, lest they should spread the infection.—P. C. R. We find the magistrates of Aberdeen in December ordaining a fast ‘in respect of the fearful infection of the plague spread abroad in divers parts of Moray.’—Ab. C. R.
‘The year of God 1600, fourteen whales, of huge bigness, were casten in by the sea, upon the sands under the town of Dornoch in Sutherland. They came in alive, and were slain immediately by the inhabitants, who reaped some commodity thereby. Some of these fishes were ninety feet in length.’—G. H. S.
Aug. 5.
In the midst of a time unmarked by great events, great excitement was caused by the attempt of the Earl of Gowrie and his brother upon the king’s liberty or life, at Perth. James Melville notes that ‘a little before or hard about the day of this accident, the sea at an instant, about low-water, debordit and ran up aboon the sea-mark, higher nor at any stream-tide, athort all the coast-side of Fife, and at an instant reteired again to almaist low-water, to the great admiration of all, and skaith done to some.’
Aug. 6.
While Robert Bruce and some others of the clergy professed to regard the conspiracy with incredulity, the great bulk of the people, going with their loyalty, as often happens, far beyond the merit of its object, manifested all tokens of extreme satisfaction at the king’s escape. On the arrival of the news, ‘there was sic joy, that the cannons shot, the bells rang, the trumpets sounded, the drums strake. The town rase in arms, with shooting of muskets, casting of fire-works, and banefires set forth; the like was never seen in Scotland, there was sic merriness and dancing all the nicht.’—Bir.
The same day, the state-officers, with some other nobles, went to the Cross, ‘and there heard Mr David Lindsay make ane orison, and the haill people sat down on their knees, giving thanks to God for the king’s deliverance out of sic ane great danger.’—Bir.
Aug. 11.
1600.
A few days later, the king returned from Perth to Edinburgh. ‘The town, with the haill suburbs, met him upon the sands of Leith in arms, with great joy and shooting of muskets, and shaking of pikes. He went to the kirk of Leith, to Mr David Lindsay’s orison. Thereafter, the town of Edinburgh having convenit, and standing at the Hie Gait [High Street], his majesty passed to the Cross, the Cross being hung with tapestry, and went up thereon with his nobles. Mr Patrick Galloway being there, made ane sermon upon the 124 psalm; he declared the haill circumstances of the treason proposed by the Earl of Gowrie and his brother, whilk the king testified by his awn mouth, sitting on the Cross all the time of the sermon.’—Bir.
Sep. 11.
‘For divers guid respects and considerations,’ the king in council ordered that thenceforth the Castle of Stirling, in which his son was kept, should not be accessible to the whole trains of the nobility and gentry at such times as the king himself was not present; but every earl should ‘have access with four persons only, every lord with twa persons, every baron with ane person, and every gentleman and other person single, and all, ane and all, without armour, saving their swords.’ All except the earls, lords, and barons, to ‘lay their swords fra them at the yett.’—P. C. R.
Soon after, there was an edict for restricting the number of persons brought to court by noblemen in their trains. An earl was enjoined to bring not ‘mony mae’ than twelve persons; a lord, eight; and a baron, four. The indefiniteness of the order amusingly marks the want of all stern will in King James.
Sep. 14.
This being the Rood Fair-day in Jedburgh, a party of rough borderers, Turnbulls, Davidsons, and others, to the number of twenty, came to the town, armed with hagbuts and pistols, and there presented themselves before the lodging of Sir Andrew Kerr of Ferniehirst, ‘fornent the market-cross, and after divers brags, insolent behaviour, and menacings, in contempt of him and his servants,’ slew his brother, Thomas Kerr, and one of his servants. Eleven persons stood a trial for this act, when it appeared that they were only, more suo, executing a horning of the sheriff of Roxburgh against Thomas Kerr. Sir Andrew Kerr and others stood a counter-trial for resisting the execution of the horning. But the only practical result was, that one Andrew Turnbull, brother of Turnbull of Bewly, was beheaded at the Cross of Edinburgh (Dec. 16) for the slaughter of Thomas Kerr.—Pit.
Oct. 8.
1600.
Francis Tennant, a wealthy merchant of Edinburgh, was hanged at the Cross of Edinburgh for uttering pasquils against the king and ‘his maist noble progenitors.’ Tennant had been an active friend of the Earl of Bothwell, and when that nobleman was at his last extremity, towards the end of 1594, this merchant-burgess had undertaken to get him delivered up to the king. ‘But by the contrair, howsoon he came to Bothwell, he revealit the cause of his coming to him, and shew[ed] what reward he had gotten, and offerit himself with all his guids in Bothwell’s will, affirming that he would not betray him for all the gold in the warld.’ It was in a ship furnished by Francis Tennant that the forlorn Bothwell escaped to France.
Francis appears to have consequently forfeited his position in his native country. Having now fallen into the king’s hands, he was arraigned for writing a calumnious letter against the king, dated at Newcastle, January 17, 1597, addressed to Mr Robert Bruce, the minister, and another to Mr John Davidson, both being under fictitious signatures; and which letters ‘he had laid down in the kirk of Edinburgh, to the effect the same might have fallen in the hands of the people, thereby to bring his majesty in contempt, and steir up his people to sedition and disobedience.’ King James must have been stung to an unusual degree of wrath by these pasquils, for, after the trial, he sent a warrant to the justice-clerk, ordering for sentence, that Francis Tennant should ‘have his tongue cuttit out at the rute,’ and then be ‘hangit.’ Four days later, indeed, he departed from this cruel order, and sent a second warrant, stating that, ‘for certain causes moving us, we have thought good to mitigate that sentence, by dispensing with the torturing of the said Francis, other [either] in the boots, or by cutting out of his tongue, and are content that ye only pronounce doom agains him to be hangit.’
Dec. 23.
The baptism of the young prince, subsequently Charles I., took place this day at Holyroodhouse. The manner in which the king obtained the means of holding any such ceremonial is illustrated by the following letter (printed literatim),[246] which he addressed on the occasion to the Laird of Dundas:
1600.
‘Richt traist friend, we greet you heartily well. The baptism of our dearest son being appointit at Halyrudhouse upon the xxiii day of Decemr instant, wherat some princes of France, strangers, with the specialis of our nobility, being invyted to be present, necessar it is that great provisions, gude cheir, and sic uther things necessary for decorations thairof be providit, whilks cannot be had without the help of sum of our loving subjects, quhairof accounting you one of the specialis, we have thought good to request you effectuously to propyne with vennysons, wyld meit, Brissel fowlis,[247] caponis, with sic other provisions as are maist seasonable at that time and errand. To be sent into Halyrudhouse upon the 22 day of the said moneth of December instant, and herewithall to invvte you to be present at that solemnitie, to take part of your awin gude cheir, as you tender our honour, and the honour of the country; swa we committ you to God. From Lithgow, this 6th of Decemr. 1600—James R.’
At the close of the century, in the midst of the order of things arranged under the care of the reformed church, we may be said to have arrived at a point where it may be proper to take a general survey of the customs and manners of the people. We are enabled to do this with comparative ease by the copious extracts which have been published from the session-records of Perth, Aberdeen, Glasgow, and Edinburgh, the burgh-records of these cities and other documents.
[SUPERSTITIONS AND SUPERSTITIOUS PRACTICES.]
Of some of the superstitions of the people, particularly that regarding the pretended power of witchcraft, abundant illustrations have been presented in the chronicle of the bypast forty years. It may now be remarked, that, besides the witches of malevolent character, who were objects of dread to the community, there were ‘wise women,’ who were understood to possess the power of curing diseases generally, and restoring the health of sickly children, by charms and other means. We hear, in 1623, of one Janet at Black Ruthven, near Perth, of whom ‘the bruit went that she could help bairns who had gotten ane dint of ill wind.’—P. K. S. R. At Ruthven, or Huntingtower, there was a well the water of which was believed to have sanative qualities when used under certain circumstances. In May 1618, two women of humble rank were before the kirk-session of Perth, ‘who being asked if they were at the well in the bank of Huntingtower the last Sabbath, if they drank thereof, and what they left at it, answered, that they drank thereof, and that each of them left a prin [pin] thereat; which was found to be a point of idolatry, in putting the well in God’s room.’—P. K. S. R. They were each fined six shillings, and compelled to make public avowal of their repentance. In August 1623, Janet Jackson was cited before the same court for following a witch’s advice in employing the deceased Isobel Haldane ‘to go silent to the well of Ruthven, and silent back again with water to wash her bairn.’ It was admitted that ‘Isobel brought the water and washed the bairn therewith, and put the bairn through a cake made of nine curns of meal gotten from women, married maidens,’ which was said to be ‘a common practice used for curing bairns of the cake-mark.’
At St Wollok’s Kirk, a ruin in the parish of Glass, Aberdeenshire, are two pools by the river’s side, amongst high rocks, and known far and wide by the name of St Wollok’s Baths, Wollok having been an anchoritic saint who dwelt here in the fifth century, and is reckoned as the first bishop of Aberdeen. These pools, always full of water even in times of the greatest drought, were resorted to so lately as the seventeenth century, if not later, for the bathing of sickly children. Near by was St Wollok’s Well, also believed to have a supernatural virtue for the healing of diseases.[248]
It was customary for great numbers of persons to go on a pilgrimage barefooted, on the first of May, to Christie’s Well, in Menteith, and there perform certain superstitious ceremonies, ‘to the great offence of God and scandal of the true religion.’ In May 1624, the Privy Council issued a commission to a number of gentlemen of the district, enjoining them to post themselves at the well and apprehend all such superstitious persons and put them into the Castle of Doune.
At the Bay of Nigg, near Aberdeen, was a well dedicated to St Fiacre, and commonly called St Fittich’s Well, which was long held in the greatest veneration for its efficacy in disease. On the 28th of November 1630, Margaret Davidson, a married woman, residing in Aberdeen, was adjudged in an unlaw of five pounds by the kirk-session, ‘for directing her nurse with her bairn to St Fiack’s Well, and washing her bairn therein for recovery of her health ... and for leaving an offering in the well.’ The prevalence of this custom is indicated by the decree of the session on the same day, threatening heavy censure and punishment to all who should be ‘found going to Sanct Fiack’s Well, for seeking health to themselves or bairns.’
This Fiack was a Scottish saint—believed to be a son of Eugenius IV., king of Scotland—and it is curious to be assured, as we are, that ‘the name fiacre was first given to hackney-coaches, because hired carriages were first made use of for the convenience of pilgrims who went from Paris to visit the shrine of this saint.’[249]
When we consider that sanative effects are attributed in our own time, by a great number of practitioners, to pure water, we may be the more disposed to believe that there was some natural ground for the faith which the simple people of old entertained regarding saints’ wells, the saintly connection being assumed of course as indifferent in the case. It is remarkable, moreover, how long this faith continued to be maintained even in its most superstitious form. We are told in the New Statistical Account of Scotland, that a well dedicated to the Virgin Mary, at Sigget in Aberdeenshire, continued, till within the memory of living persons, to be resorted to on Pasch Sunday, the votaries always taking care to leave money or some other article beside the venerated lymph on departing. In Easter Ross, there are wells which are still resorted to by some of the more ignorant portion of the rustic classes.
Charms for the healing of sores and gunshot wounds were in great vogue. In May 1631, Laurence Boak and his wife were before the kirk-session of Perth, accused of using such charms, and they admitted that the following was the formula employed for sores:
‘Thir sairs are risen through God’s wark,
And must be laid through God’s help;
The mother Mary, and her dear son,
Lay thir sairs that are begun.’
The chief of fallen spirits was the subject of a strange superstition, which dictated that a piece of every farm should be left untilled for his especial honour. It went by the respectful appellation of the Goodman’s Croft. In May 1594, the General Assembly had under their attention that such a weird custom was rife in Garioch, Aberdeenshire; and it called for an act of the Estates ‘ordaining all persons possessors of the said lands, to cause labour the same, betwixt and a certain day to be appointed thereto; otherwise, in case of disobedience, the said lands to fall into the king’s hands, to be disponed to such persons as please his majesty, who will labour the same.’—Cal.
So lately as 1651, at a visitation of the kirk of Rhynie in Aberdeenshire, it was admitted by Sir William Gordon of Lesmore, that a part of his mains or home-farm was given away to the Goodman, and used not to be laboured; ‘but he had a mind, by the assistance of God, to cause labour the same.’[250]
Some religious practices of the Romish Church continued to be in vogue for many years after the Reformation, notwithstanding all that the Presbyterian kirk could do for their suppression. There had been a custom of pilgrimising, for penitential purposes, to certain holy places, precisely as there still is in the more Catholic districts of Ireland. We may presume that, as in the sister-island, people went barefooted to the sacred spot, walked on bare knees repeatedly round it, repeating prayers, and afterwards formally confessed their sins to the priests who superintended the ceremonial. In these reformed times, the affair would be of course shorn of many of its rites; but certainly the habit of going on pilgrimage was still such as to give great concern to presbyteries and general assemblies. One of the chief places still in vogue was the Chapel of Grace, on the western bank of the Spey, near Fochabers—a mere ruin, but held in great veneration, and resorted to by devout people from all parts of the north of Scotland. Another was the Chapel of the Virgin, at Ordiquhill in Banffshire, where also there was a well believed to possess miraculous virtue. We find the General Assembly which met at Linlithgow in 1608, recommending that, for remedy of the growth of papistry, ‘order be taken with the pilgrimages’—specifying these two, and a well in the district of Enzie. Of course Catholics were most disposed to making the pilgrimages. In 1592 Robert Wauchope of Caikmuir, suspected papist, was accused before his presbytery of going yearly barefooted in pilgrimage to the Cross of Peebles, and he admitted having been guilty of such proceedings a few years back, but now he had given it up as a ‘rite unprofitable and ungodly.’ We hear of Lady Aboyne going to the Chapel of Grace every year, being a journey of thirty Scotch miles, the two last of which she always performed on her bare feet.[251] About the time of the National Covenant (1638), what remained of the Chapel of Grace was thrown down, with a view to putting a stop to the practice; but this seems to have been far from an effectual measure. In a work written in 1775, the author says: ‘In the north end of the parish [of Dundurcus] stood the Chapel of Grace, and near to it the well of that name, to which multitudes from the Western Isles do still resort, and nothing short of violence can restrain their superstition.’[252]
There were even practices of an obviously heathen origin still flourishing in the country. That of kindling fires at Midsummer and on St Peter’s Eve seems to have been among the most difficult to eradicate. In July 1608, several inhabitants of Aberdeen were accused before the kirk-session, of having had fires kindled in front of their houses on one of these evenings. Gilbert Keith of Achiries, ‘a common banner and swearer,’ confessed the fault. Mr Thomas Menzies, bailie, gave an equivocating answer. Others alleged that the fires had been kindled by their servants and children.—A. K S. R.
[HOLIDAYS AND POPULAR PLAYS.]
The observance of Yule (Christmas), Pasch (Easter), and the various saints’ days, had been sternly repressed at the Reformation. So were the May-games and other holiday amusements in vogue under the ancient faith. Nevertheless, we still find all of these matters enjoying a sort of twilight life. They assert their vitality by the very efforts made from time to time to extinguish them. Passing over the Robin Hood play and other Edinburgh May-sports, to which repeated reference has been made in the chronicle, we may advert to the corresponding doings at the Fair City of the Tay.
The people of Perth had been in the habit, before the Reformation, of observing Corpus Christi Day (second Thursday after Whitsunday) and St Obert’s Day. On the former, it was customary to have a play. After the change of religion, there was a great inclination to keep up these old practices, which the church, however, condemned as ‘idolatrous, superstitious, and slanderous.’ In 1577, the kirk-session of Perth prosecuted several persons for taking part in the Corpus Christi play. Thomas Thorsails, who had borne the ensenyie or flag, had to submit himself to the discipline of the kirk, and promise ‘never to meddle with such things again,’ in order that he might have his bairn baptised. A considerable number of persons had to make the like submission that they might be at peace with the session. Nevertheless, on the ensuing 10th of December, being St Obert’s Eve, there was a procession as usual; and several citizens were brought to submission, ‘in that they superstitiously passed about the town, disguised, in piping and dancing, and torches bearing.’ John Fyvie afterwards confessed that on this occasion ‘he passed through the town striking the drum, which was one of the common drums of the town, accompanied with certain others—such as John Macbeth, William Jack riding upon ane horse going in men’s shoes.’—P. K. S. R.
In Aberdeen, December 30, 1574, certain persons were charged before the kirk-session of Aberdeen ‘for playing, dancing, and singing of filthy carols on Yule Day [Christmas Day] at even, and on Sunday at even thereafter.’—A. K. S. R. January 10, 1575-6, ‘the haill deacons of crafts within this burgh are ordained to take trial of their crafts for sitting idle on Yule Day last was.’—Ibid. In Perth, January 10, 1596-7, ‘William Williamson, baxter, is accused of baking and selling great loaves at Yule, which was slanderous, and cherishing a superstition in the hearts of the ignorant.’—P. K. S. R.
[FROLICS AND MASQUERADINGS.]
The sessions appear to have everywhere had great battlings with old-accustomed habits of festival-keeping and merry-making, in which the people indulged, probably without any idea of committing a sin. Some of their habits were connected with superstition, and thus gave double offence.
There was a cave called the Dragon-hole, on the face of the Kinnoul Hill near Perth. It was of difficult access, and old tradition had her stories about it. The common sort of people were accustomed to make a merry procession to the Dragon-hole once a year in May; perhaps they had continued to do so since the days of heathenrie. May 2, 1580, ‘because that the assembly of minister and elders understand that the resort to the Dragon-hole, as well by young men as women, with their piping and drums striking before them through this town, had raised no small slander to this congregation,’ they therefore ordain that each person guilty of this practice shall pay twenty shillings to the poor, and make public repentance.
Notwithstanding all efforts at repression, cases of excessive conviviality and of questionable frolics are not infrequent in these moral registers. It seems to have been a favourite prank to interchange the dresses of the sexes, and make a parade through the town by night, singing merry songs. At Aberdeen, February 9, 1575-6, Madge Morison is ‘decreit to pay 6s. 8d. to the magistrate, and Andrew Caithness is become caution for her repentance-making when she is required, and that for the abusing of herself in claithing of her with men’s claiths at the lyke [wake] of George Elmsly’s wife.’ A month after, in the same place, a group of women, ‘tryit presently as dancers in men’s claiths, under silence of night, in house and through the town,’ are assured that if found hereafter in the same fault, ‘they sall be debarrit fra all benefit of the kirk, and openly proclaimit in pulpit.’
At some blithesome bridal which took place in Aberdeen in August 1605, a number of young men and women danced through the town together, ‘the young men being clad in women’s apparel, whilk is accounted ane abomination (Deut. xxii. 5), and the young women with masks on their faces, thereby passing the bounds of modesty and shamefacedness, whilk aught to be in young women, namely [especially] in a reformed city.’ The matter was referred to the provincial assembly, and severe penalties threatened for future instances of the offence.—A. K. S. R.
At Perth, in 1609, we find the kirk-session dealing with an ultra-merry company, composed of Andrew Johnston, James Jackson, and David Dickson, and three women, two of whom were the wives of the first two men. They were accused of having gone about the town on the evening of the preceding Tuesday, disguised, and with swords and staves, molesting their neighbours. They stated that they had been supping, and after supper, from mere merriness, had gone about the town, but without molesting anybody. ‘It was certainly found that they were disguised; namely, Andrew Johnston’s wife having her hair hanging down, and a black hat upon her head; her husband with a sword into his hand; James Jackson having a mutch [woman’s cap] upon his head, and a woman’s gown; and that they hurt and molested several persons.’ The matter was aggravated by the consideration that it was a time of plague, and the offenders were convalescents new come in from the fields, with ‘the blotch and boil’ still on their persons. A public repentance was decreed to them.—P. K. S. R.
The chief element of conviviality among the common people, at this time, and for several generations later, was a light ale which the keepers of taverns made at home; hence browster-wife came to be a synonym for a woman keeping a public-house. The fierier and more fatal whisky was, however, not unknown. In the Aberdeen Kirk-session Register, under March 1606, we have two men brought up for ‘abusing themselves last week by extraordinar drinking of aqua-vitie.’
[OBSERVANCE OF SUNDAY.]
The Protestant Church took the observance of Sunday as a Sabbath from the ancient church; and the Presbyterians of Scotland adopted it fully, while rejecting all the other festivals—a fact with which Ninian Winzet did not fail to taunt them as an inconsistency in his Tractates, published immediately after the Reformation.[253] Not merely ecclesiastical acts, but several statutes of the realm, were put in effect for the purpose of enforcing the observance of the day as a day of rest and of religious exercises. From the terms of these, however, and from the accounts we have of frequent punishments for their neglect or infraction, it is evident that many years elapsed before the people of Scotland attained to that placid acquiescence in the order for the day which we now see.
The main demands of the new church were for a complete abstinence from work and market-holding, as well as from public amusements, and a regular attendance on the sermons. We have seen some instances of the struggles of the church to induce mercantile people to abandon Sunday-marketing. So late as 1596, it is evident that their wishes were not fully attained, as we find the presbytery of Meigle then complaining to the Privy Council of the obstinate refusal of the people in their district to abandon a Sunday-market.[254] Two years later, the Town Council of Aberdeen was content to ordain that ‘nae mercat, either of fish or flesh, shall be on the Sabbath-day in time of sermon‘—a clear proof that they did not look for a complete suppression of marketing on that day, but only its cessation in time of church-service. There are many similar indications that at this early period taverns were allowed to be open, and public amusements permitted, at times of the day apart from ‘the sermons.’ It is somewhat startling to find the General Assembly itself, in 1579, expressing indifference to marriages being solemnised on Sunday (B. U. K.), and only so late as January 1586, discharging ‘all marriages to be made on Sundays in the morning in time coming.’ Nor is it less surprising to find a kirk-session, so late as 1607, requiring that ‘the mill be stayit from grinding on the Sabbath-day, at least by eight in the morning.’[255] It clearly appears to have been common in 1609 for tailors, shoemakers, and bakers in Aberdeen, to work till eight or nine every Sunday morning, ‘as gif it were ane ouk day.’—A. K. S. R.
Breach of the Sunday arrangements was usually punished by fines. In Aberdeen, in 1562, for an elder or deacon of the church to be absent from the preachings, inferred a penalty of ‘twa shillings;’ for ‘others honest persons of the town,’ sixpence. November 24, 1575, it is statute that ‘all persons being absent fra the preachings on the Sunday, without lawful business, and all persons ganging in the gait or playing in the links [downs], or other places, the times of preaching or prayers on the Sunday, and all persons making mercat merchandise on Sunday within the town ... sall be secluded fra all benefit of the kirk unto the time they satisfy the kirk in their repentance, and [the] magistrate by ane pecunial fine.’ Notwithstanding this statute, we find the Town Council in 1588 referring to the fact, that a great number of the inhabitants of the burgh keep away from church both on Sundays and week-days, and give themselves to ‘gaming and playing, passing to taverns and ale-houses, using the trade of merchandise and handy labour in time of sermon on the week-day;’ for which reason it is ordained that all shall attend the sermons on Sunday, ‘afore and after noon;’ as also every Tuesday and Thursday ‘afore noon,’ under certain penalties—a householder or his wife, 13s. 4d.; a craftsman, 6s. 8d.; ‘and in case ony merchand or burgess of guild be found within his merchand booth after the ringing of the third bell to the sermon on the week-day, to pay 6s. 8d.’ These ordinances were acted upon. November 28, 1602, ‘the wife of James Bannerman, for working on the Sabbath-day, [is] unlawit in 6s. 8d.’ ‘The same day, the session ordains that nae baxters within this burgh work, nor bake any baken meat, in time coming, on the Sabbath-day.’ Four Aberdeen citizens were, January 16, 1603, ‘unlawit, ilk ane of them, in 3s. 4d., for their absence fra the sermons on Sunday last, confessit by themselves.’—Ab. C. R. Soon after we find a bailie and two elders appointed to go through the town in time of sermon, and searching any house they pleased, note the names of all they found at home; likewise to watch the ferry-boat, and note the names of ‘sic as gangs to Downie, that they may be punishit.’—A. K. S. R.
At Perth, January 8, 1582-3, ‘it was ordained that an elder of every quarter shall pass through the same every Sunday in time of preaching before noon, their time about, and note them that are found in taverns, baxters’ booths, or on the gaits, and delate them to the Assembly, that every one of them that is absent from the kirk may be poinded for twenty shillings, according to the act of parliament.’ Soon after, a married woman named Hunter was fined three pounds for her absence from church during the bygone year, and other three pounds for her absence during the time of fasting. In September 1585, tavern-keepers were subjected to a heavy fine for selling wine and ale in time of sermon. In 1587, the Sunday penalties were extended to the Thursday sermon. February 21, 1591-2, John Pitscottie, younger of Luncarty, and several other persons, ‘confessed that on the Sunday of the fast, in the time of preaching in the afternoon, they were playing at foot-ball in the Meadow Inch of the Muirton, and that the same was an offence; therefore they were ordained on Sunday next to make their repentance.’
In the same town, January 29, 1592-3, ‘the Lady Innernytie being called, and accused for absenting herself and the rest of her family from the hearing of the word on Sabbath, compears and confesses that she does it not, neither in contempt of the word nor of the minister, but only by reason of her sickness, and promises when she shall be well in health, to repair more frequently to the kirk and hearing of the word.’ This lady was the wife of Elphinstone of Innernytie, a judge of the Court of Session, and a Catholic. It is therefore probable that her submission was hypocritical. July 31, 1598, ‘Andrew Robertson, chirurgeon, being accused of breaking the Sabbath-day by polling and razing of the Laird of ... , declared he did it quietly at the request of the gentleman, without outgoing.’ He was ordained to make repentance, and warned for the future. It will be understood that under the designation of chirurgeon both surgery and the functions of the barber were embraced.
The Perth kirk-session also exerted itself to prevent Highland reapers from sauntering on the streets on Sunday, waiting to be hired (August 1593); and they took strong measures to put an end to the practice of cadgers departing from the Saturday market on Sunday morning (March 1599). Four persons were rebuked in November of this last year for ‘playing at golf on the North Inch in the time of the preaching after noon on the Sabbath’—a sport which would not now be indulged in on Sunday in any part of Scotland. April 13, 1601, ‘George Murray [was] accused for suffering of ale to be sold in time of preaching on the Sabbath in his house. [He] answered that he was in the kirk himself, and his wife also; but his servant came, and brought his wife out of the kirk to ane daughter of Tullibardine’s [Murray of Tullibardine—the family since become Dukes of Athole], to give her some clothes which she had of hers in custody, and in the mean time caused fill drink to the said gentlewoman and her servants with her.’ Murray was dismissed with an admonition.
By a stern act of the Aberdeen town-council, passed in 1598, a severe tariff of fines was ordained for various ranks of people on their staying away from Sunday and week-day services in the churches, every husband to be answerable for his wife, and every master for his servants. A burgess of guild or his wife was to pay 13s. 4d. for absence from church on Sunday. ‘Likewise, following the example of other weel-reformit congregations of this realm, [the council] statutes and ordains that the wives of all burgesses of guild, and of the maist honest and substantious craftsmen of this burgh, sall sit in the midst and body of the kirk in time of sermon, and not in the side-ailes, nor behind pillars, to the effect that they may mair easily see and hear the deliverer and preacher of the word; and siclike ordains, that the women of the ranks aforesaid sall repair to the kirk, every ane of them having a cloak, as the maist comely and decent outer garment, and not with plaids, as has been frequently used; and that every ane of them likewise sall have stules, sae mony as may commodiously have the same, according to the decent form observed in all reformit burghs and congregations of this realm.’—Ab. C. R.
While it is thus apparent that observance during time of sermon and attendance thereupon were the principal objects held in view, it clearly appears that the day, in its totality, was then a different thing from what it now is. It was, as in Norway still, held to commence at sunset of Saturday, and to terminate on Sunday at sunset, or at six o’clock. As illustrations of this fact, two curious notices may be cited. In May 1594, the presbytery of Glasgow is found forbidding a piper to play his pipes on Sunday ‘frae the sun rising till the sun going-to.’[256] When a fast was ordained in Edinburgh, in December 1574, on account of impending pestilence, it was to commence ‘on Saturday next at aucht hours at even, and sae to continue while [until] Sunday at six hours at even.’[257] An act of the presbytery of Glasgow, January 1, 1635, ordered that the Sabbath be from 12 on Saturday night to 12 on Sunday night;[258] a clear proof that there was previously a different arrangement.
Another curious fact, indicative of a progress in the ideas of the reformed kirk as to Sabbath-keeping, is that there were ‘play-Sundays’ till the end of the sixteenth century. The presbytery of Aberdeen ordered in 1599 that ‘there be nae play-Sundays hereafter, under all hiest pain.’—A. P. R.
In April 1600, in obedience to an ordinance of the General Assembly, it was arranged at Aberdeen—and of course a similar arrangement would be made in other places—that ‘on Thursday, ilk ouk [every week], the masters of households, their wives, bairns, and servants should compeir, ilk ane within their awn parish kirk, to their awn minister, to be instructit by them in the grunds of religion and heads of catechism, and to give, as they should be demanded, ane proof and trial of their profiting in the said heads.’
After this arrangement had been made, the religious observances of the citizen occupied a considerable share of his time. He was bound under penalties to be twice in church on Sunday, to make Monday a ‘pastime-day, for eschewing of the profanation of the Sabbath-day,’ to give Tuesday forenoon to a service in the parish church, to do the same on Thursday forenoon, and on that day also to attend a catechetical meeting with his family. Three forenoons each week remained for his business and ordinary affairs. Notwithstanding this liberal amount of external observance, the General Assembly appointed, in 1601, ‘a general humiliation for the sins of the land and contempt of the gospel, to be kept the two last Sabbaths of June and all the week intervening.’
[LICENTIOUS CONDUCT.]
Licentious conduct was from the first an object of severe observation to the reformed church, and many sharp measures were taken and harsh punishments inflicted for its repression.
In 1562, the kirk-session of Aberdeen ordained as its punishment, for the first offence, exposure before the congregation; for the second, carting and ducking; for the third, banishment from the town. A subsequent act of parliament imposed still severer punishment—‘That is to say, for the first fault, as weel the man as the woman sall pay the sowm of forty pounds, or than [else] he and she sall be imprisoned for the space of aucht days, their food to be breid and small drink, and thereafter present[ed] to the mercat-place of the town or parochin, barehead[ed], and there stand fastened, that they may not remove, for the space of twa hours.’ To this punishment some additions were made for a second offence, as cold water for food, and a shaving of the head. A third inferred ducking and banishment.
At Aberdeen, in 1591, in a case where a marriage relationship existed, the punishment inferred the depth of horror with which the offence was on that account regarded, the man being ordained to be banished from the town, but first to be set up at the cross on three several market-days, bound to the pillar by a pair of branks, and having a paper-crown on his head inscribed with his crime; also to stand on three several Sundays at the kirk-door, in haircloth, barelegged and barefooted, while the people are assembling; after which to be exposed in like guise at the pillar of repentance during the whole time of worship.[259]
November 20, 1582, the kirk-session of Perth ordains John Ronaldson, having offenders of this class in his custody, ‘to put every one of them in a sundry house in time coming, to give them bread and small drink, to let none of them come to the nether window [probably a window where they could see or converse with the people passing on the street]; and when they come to the cross-head, that they shall be fast locked in the irons two hours, their kurchies [caps] off their heads, and their faces bare, without ane plaid or any other covering.’
A stool or seat was raised in a conspicuous situation in each church, where penitents under this as well as other offences had to sit during service, and afterwards bear the rebuke of the minister. Many entries in the session records shew the difficulty there had always been in getting penitents, while in this situation, to remain unmuffled or uncovered. The only correction that seems to have been available was to ordain that such a sitting went for nothing. The Aberdeen session, August 1608, ordain that, ‘because, in times past, most part of women that come to the pillar to make their public repentance, sat thereon with their plaids about their head, coming down over their faces the haill time of their sitting on the stool, so that almaist nane of the congregation could see their faces, or knaw what they were, whereby they made nae account of their coming to the stool, but misregarded the same altogether’—the officer should thenceforth take the plaid away from each penitent ‘before her upganging to the pillar.’ The Perth session, in August 1599, had to take sharp measures with Margaret Marr, because being exalted to the seat of repentance, ‘she sat in the back side with her face covered, and being desired by John Jack, officiar, to sit on the fore side, and uncover her face that she might be seen, she uttered words against him in a bitter manner, and extended her voice in such sort that she was heard through all the kirk in time of sermon, and so behaved herself uncomely in the presence of strangers, to the great slander of this congregation.’ In very gross cases, a paper-crown was added to the external marks of infamy inflicted on delinquents.
As a specimen of the interference with private life to which the clergy were led in their anxiety to suppress licentiousness—the kirk-session of Perth (1586-7) would not suffer two unmarried sisters to continue to live together in one house, but ordained them to go to service, ‘or where they may be best entertained without slander,’ under pain of imprisonment and banishment from the town.
A custom obtained in those days of entering into conjugal life on the strength simply of a contract of marriage. It was called hand-fasting. The ceremony of marriage might take place afterwards or not, as the parties pleased. This the reformed clergy denounced as immoral, and they set themselves to correct it. The Aberdeen session, December 10, 1562, ordained, ‘Because sundry and many within this town are hand-fast, as they call it, and made promise of marriage a long space bygane, some seven year, some sax year, some langer, some shorter, and as yet will not marry and complete that honourable band, nother for fear of God nor love of their party’—that ‘all sic persons as has promised marriage faithfully complete the samen betwixt this and Fasteren’s Even next to come;’ penalty left blank. Such parties are also ordained in the meantime to live as single persons. April 12, 1568, the same session ordained that ‘neither the minister nor reader be present at contracts of marriage-making, as they call their hand-fastings, nor make nae sic band.’
The kirk-session records of the period must be held as revealing on the whole a very low state of morals, particularly among the humbler classes of the people.
[ECCLESIASTICAL DISCIPLINE IN OTHER MATTERS.]
Ecclesiastical discipline took upon it in those days to interfere with many matters in which it would be set at defiance in our day. It was part of the earnestness of the general religious feeling, while as yet no one had ventured to think that there are points which may best be left to the private consciousness, or which, at least, it can serve no good end to make matter of public regulation.
Of the sharp dealing of the Presbyterian preachers and their courts with avowed Catholics, we have already seen abundant illustrations, and more will yet be presented. Having become satisfied that the Catholic religion was a system of damnable error, our ancestors acted logically on the conviction, and thought no measure, however forcible or severe, misapplied, if it could save the people of that persuasion from the unavoidable consequences, and prevent the evil from spreading. To purge the land of papists and idolaters was therefore an object held constantly in view by the church-courts.
The slightest suspicion of being papistically inclined was sure to bring any one to trouble. One David Calderwood in Glasgow being found in possession of a copy of Archbishop Hamilton’s popish catechism, the presbytery sent a minister ‘to try and find of the said David’s religion.’ Another citizen of Glasgow was taken to task, on a charge of having, in the way of his profession as a painter, painted crucifixes in sundry houses. A Lady Livingston being suspected of unsoundness in the faith, in order ‘that she may be won to God,’ a deputation was sent by the presbytery to confer with her, ‘anent the heads of religion,’ and she was summoned under pain of excommunication. The same reverend body, hearing of one James Fleming, an Irishman, sent ‘to inquire of him his religion,’ On the 5th of June 1599, they are found taking measures for discovering Irishmen in their bounds, and ascertaining ‘wha are papists and pernicious to others they haunt amang.’
That to receive a Catholic priest into one’s house was a serious matter in those days, there is abundant evidence, some of which will be found in the sequel. But even to receive or keep company with an excommunicated papist, inferred severe pains; and in the Perth kirk-session register there are several instances of these being inflicted. For example, Gabriel Mercer was, in 1595, ordered to make public declaration from his seat in church of his offence in entertaining for three days Elphinstone of Innernytie, an excommunicated papist. The same order was given in 1610 in the case of Alexander Crichton of Perth, ‘who was convicted on his own confession of haunting and frequenting the company of Robert Crichton, excommunicate papist, eating and drinking with him in taverns, and walking on the street.’—P. K. S. R.
In 1598, we find the presbytery of Glasgow concerning itself about a young man who had passed his father without lifting his bonnet. He was judged ‘a stubborn and disobedient son to his father.’ About 1574, the kirk-session of Edinburgh was occupied for some days in considering the case of Niel Laing, accused of making a pompous convoy and superfluous banqueting at the marriage of Margaret Danielston, ‘to the great slander of the kirk,’ which had forbid such doings.
The absence of external appearances of joy in Scotland, in contrast with the frequent holidayings and merry-makings of the continent, has been much remarked upon. We find in the records of ecclesiastical discipline clear traces of the process by which this distinction was brought about. To the puritan kirk of the sixteenth and seventeenth centuries every outward demonstration of natural good spirits was a sort of sin, to be as far as possible repressed. To make marriages sober and quiet was one special object. It was customary in humble life for a young couple, on being wedded, to receive miscellaneous company, and hold a kind of ball, each person contributing towards the expenses, with something over for the benefit of the young pair. Such a custom has been kept up almost to our own time, but much shorn of its original spirit. In the latter years of the sixteenth century, it was customary for the party to go to the Market-cross, and dance round it. At Stirling, October 30, 1600, the kirk-session, finding ‘there has been great dancing and vanity publicly at the Cross usit by married persons and their company on their marriage-day,’ took measures to put a stop to the practice. It ordained ‘that nane be married till ten pounds be consigned, for the better security that there be nae mair ta’en for ane bridal lawing than five shillings according to order,’ ‘with certification, gif the order of the bridal lawing be broken, the said ten pounds sall be confiscat.’[260]
In like manner the kirk-session of Cambusnethan, in September 1649, ordained ‘that there suld be no pipers at bridals, and who ever suld have a piper playing at their bridal, sall lose their consigned money.’ And in June next year, the same reverend body decreed that men and women ‘guilty of promiscuous dancing,’ should stand in a public place and confess their fault.[261]
The power of the kirk to enforce its discipline and maintain conformity, was a formidable one, resting ultimately on their sentence of excommunication, of which the following contemporary description may be given: ‘... whasoever incurs the danger thereof is given over in thir days by the ministers, in presence of the haill people assembled at the kirk, in the hands of Satan, as not worthy of Christian society, and therefore made odious to all men, that they should eschew his company, and refuse him all kind of hospitality; and the person thus continuing in refusal by the space of a haill year, his goods are decerned to appertain to the king, sae lang as the disobedient lives.’[262]—H. K. J.
No unprejudiced person can doubt that the Presbyterian clergy of this age were in general correct in their own deportment, and sincerely anxious to promote virtue among the people; but it is also evident to us, under our superior lights, that they carried their discipline to a pitch at once irreconcilable with the natural rights of mankind, and calculated to have effects different from what were intended. It dived too much into the details of private life, was too inconsiderate of human infirmity, was extremely cruel, and altogether erred in trusting too much to force and too little to moral suasion. Even the innocent playfulness of the human heart seems to have been viewed by these stern moralists as an evil thing, or at least a thing leaning to the side of vice. On the injurious tendency of any system which equally makes a crime out of some peculiarity of opinion, or indifferent action, and of an actual infraction of the rights of our fellow-creatures, it were needless to insist.
[CUSTOMS.]
In the Council Register of Aberdeen, we obtain many notices of the customs of the burgh, most of which were probably common to other towns.
It seems to have been the practice of the whole people to assemble, but only at command of the council, in order to deliberate together upon any matter of importance, and make such arrangements as were required for the general weal. For this purpose, they were summoned by the bellman, who went through ‘the haill rews of the town’ ringing his bell, of which he had to make oath in order to render legal what was ordained by the meeting.
In 1574, it was ordained at such a meeting that John Cowpar should ‘pass every day in the morning at four hours, and every nicht at eight hours, through all the rews of the town, playing upon the Almany whistle [German flute?], with ane servant with him playing on the tabroun, whereby the craftsmen their servants and all others laborious folks, being warnit and excitat, may pass to their labours and frae their labours in due and convenient time.’
In 1576, it is ‘statute with consent of the haill town, that every brother of guild, merchant, and craftsman, shall have in all time coming ane halbert, Danish axe, and javelin within his booth.’ The wearing of plaids by the citizens was at the same time strictly forbidden, also the use of blue bonnets—for what reason does not clearly appear. The town’s landmarks were ridden every year. The keeping of swine within the town is (1578) forbidden, on penalty of having the animals taken and slain.
December 5, 1582, the town-council of Aberdeen ratified a contract with John Kay, lorimer, ‘anent the mending of the town’s three knocks [clocks], and buying fra him of the new knock, for payment to the said John of twa hundred merks.’ December 17, 1595, the council, considering that ‘the twa common knocks of this burgh—namely, the kirk knock and the tolbooth knock—sin Martinmass last, has been evil handlit and rulit, and has not gane induring the said space, feed Thomas Gordon, gunmaker, to rule the said twa knocks, and to cause them gang and strike the hours richtly baith night and day.’ The employment of a lorimer and a gunmaker in this business seems to imply, that a clockmaker or watchmaker was not yet one of the trades of Aberdeen.
By an old custom, the boys of the grammar-school of Aberdeen had at Christmas taken possession of the school, to the exclusion of their masters and all authority, and a vacation of about a fortnight took place. In 1580 and 1581, the magistrates are found exerting themselves to enforce certain statutes by which this assumed privilege of the boys had been abrogated and discharged; and they agreed that to make up for the vacation, there should be three holidays at the beginning of each quarter, making twelve in all for the year. From this and other facts, it appears that the long vacation now customary in summer or autumn in Scottish schools, was then unknown.
The school disorder at Yule is again spoken of in 1604 as very violent, the boys ‘keeping and halding the same against their masters with swords, guns, pistols, and other weapons, spulying and taking of puir folks’ geir, sic as geese, fowls, peats, and other vivres, during the halding thereof.’ It is ordered that, to avoid such disorders in future, no boy from without the town shall be admitted without a caution for his good-behaviour.
The Aberdeen magistrates, on hearing (February 22, 1593-4) how the burghs of Edinburgh, Perth, Dundee, and Montrose had celebrated the birth of a son and heir to the king ‘by bigging of fires, praising and thanking God for the benefit, by singing of psalms through the haill streets and rews of the towns, drinking of wine at the crosses thereof, and otherwise liberally bestowing of spiceries,’ ordained that it should be similarly observed in their burgh on Sunday next, the 24th instant, immediately after the afternoon sermon. It was ordered that there should be ‘ane table covered at the Cross, for the magistrates and baith the councils, with twa boyns[263] of English beer ... the wine to be drunken in sic a reasonable quantity as the dean of guild sall devise, four dozen buists[264] of scorchets,[265] confeits, and confections, to be casten among the people, with glasses to be broken.’
June 7, 1596, a number of persons are cited as contravening the ancient statutes ordaining that ‘all burgesses of guild and freemen of free regal burghs sall dwell, mak their residence and remaining, with their wives, bairns, servants, households, and family, hauld stob and stake,[266] fire and flet,[267] within the burgh where they are free, scot, lot, watch, walk, and ward.’ In the event of their not conforming to the rule by an appointed day, they are assured that they shall lose their privileges.
A prayer appointed (1598) to be said before the election of the magistrates of Aberdeen is not unworthy of preservation, as a trait of the feelings of such communities in that age: ‘Eternal and ever-hearing God, who has created mankind to society, in the whilk thou that is the God of order and hates confusion, has appointed some to rule and govern, and others to be governed, and for this cause has set down in thy word the notes and marks of sic as thou hast appointed to bear government; likeas of thy great mercy thou has gathered us to be ane of the famous and honourable burghs of this kingdom, and has reservit to us this liberty, yearly to cheise our council and magistrates; we beseech thee, for thy Christ’s sake, seeing we are presently assembled for that purpose, be present in the midst of us, furnish us with spiritual wisdom, and direct our hearts in sic sort, that, all corrupt affections being removed, we may cheise baith to be council and magistrates, for the year to come, of our brethren fearing God, men of knawledge, haters of avarice, and men of courage and action, that all our proceedings herein may tend to thy glory, to the weel of the haill inhabitants of this burgh, and we may have a good testimony of conscience before thee....’
In the Aberdeen council records, frequent allusions are made to ‘a custom observit in this burgh heretofore in all ages,’ of giving an entertainment to strangers of distinction on their arriving in the town. Being informed, December 13, 1598, that the Duke of Lennox and the Earl of Huntly are to be in the town this night, the council ‘ordains the said twa noblemen, in signification of the town’s guid will and favour, to be remembered with the wine and spicery at their here-coming.’ The articles ordered are, ‘ane dozen buists of scorchets, confeits, and confections, together with six quarts of wine, thereof three quarts of the best wine, to wit, Hullock and wine tent, and three quarts of other wine.’ The Earl of Huntly got another similar entertainment, March 28, 1599, on coming to Aberdeen, ‘for halding of justice-courts on shooters and havers of pistols.’
A comical regulation regarding public worship occurs in the Perth kirk-session record under 1616. The session ordained ‘John Tenender, session-officer, to have his red staff in the kirk on the Sabbath-days, therewith to wauken sleepers, and to remove greeting bairns furth of the kirk.’ Acts of session referring to the practice of the bringing of dogs into church, by which worship was much disturbed, are also frequent.
The hours for meals were in those days of a primitive description. King Henry, Lord Darnley, dined at two o’clock. This was, however, comparatively a late hour. In 1589, King James, then living in William Fowler’s house in Edinburgh, went out to the hunting in the morning, ‘trysting to come in to his dinner about ane afternoon.’—Moy. In 1607, the wooden bridge of Perth was carried away by a flood ‘betwixt twelve and ane, on ane Sunday, in time of dinner.’ Queen Mary was sitting at supper between five and six in the afternoon, when Riccio was reft from her side and slaughtered. And Agnes Sampson, the noted witch, appointed certain persons to meet her in the garden at Edmondstone, ‘after supper, betwixt five and sax at even.’ The reader will remember that it was after supper, and probably some conviviality following upon it, that King James (May 1587) led forth his nobility in procession to the Cross of Edinburgh, and delighted the citizens with the spectacle of so many reconciled enemies.
[TRAITS OF MANNERS.]
The Aberdeen council, in 1592, ‘considering the wicked and ungodly use croppen in and ower frequently usit amang all sorts of people, in blaspheming of God’s holy name, and swearing of horrible and execrable aiths,’ ordained the same to be punished by fine. To make this the more effectual, masters were ordained to exact the fines from their servants, and deduct them from wages; husbands to do the same from their wives, keeping a box in which to put the money, and punish their children for the like offence with ‘palmers’ [an instrument for inflicting lashes on the open hand]—‘according to the custom of other weel-reformed towns and congregations.’ In 1604, the presbytery of Aberdeen enforced this effort of the magistracy by an edict, ordering that, for the repression of oaths and blasphemous language, the master of every house should keep a ‘palmer,’ and therewith punish all offenders who have no money to pay fines.—A. P. R.
In February 1592-3, the Aberdeen council, when expecting a visit of the king, ordained that ‘there sall be propynit to his majesty’s house ... ane puncheon of auld Bourdeaux wine, gif it may be had for money, and, gif not, ane last of the best and finest ale that may be gotten within this burgh, together with ... four pund wecht of pepper, half pund of maces, four unces of saffron, half pund of cannel, fourteen pund of sucker, twa dozen buists of confeits, ane dozen buists of sucker-almonds, twa dozen buists of confections, and ane chalder of coals.’
The king informed the council of Aberdeen in a letter, June 1596, that he understood ‘that the inhabitants and others resorting to this burgh, cease not openly to wear forbidden weapons, to the great contempt of his hieness’ authority and laws.’ He demands, and the council agrees, that strict order shall be taken to put down this custom, agreeably to acts of parliament.
The council records of Aberdeen do not bear traces of such frequent street-conflicts as prevailed in Edinburgh during this period. Such troubles were not, however, unknown. We find, for example, one citizen now and then drawing his whinger upon another, and either commencing a fight, or frightening away his adversary. In November 1598, a quarrel having taken place between a gentleman named Gordon, brother of Gordon of Cairnbarrow, and one Caldwell, a dependent and servant of Keith of Benholm, the magistrates immediately feared a disturbance in which Keith’s chief, the Earl Marischal, would as a matter of course be involved, and hearing that the parties were ‘convocating their friends on either side to come to the cawsey and trouble the town, and to invade others,’ they ordered that ‘the haill neighbours of this burgh, merchants and craftsmen, should ... compear in their arms, and specially in lang weapons ... for staying of trouble to be betwixt the said parties ... and that the town be warnit to that effect by the officers in particular, bell or drum, as sall be thought expedient in general.’
Popery, not infidelity, was the bugbear of those days; but heterodox opinions were not altogether unknown. The public notice taken of them was of a kind which might be expected in an age of sincere faith, unacquainted with reactions or with refined policy. At Aberdeen, one Mr William Murdo was apprehended by the magistrates, 6th January 1592, as ‘a maintainer of errors, and blasphemer against the ancient prophets and Christ’s apostles, ane wha damns the haill Auld Testament except the ten commandments, and the New Testament except the Lord’s Prayer; an open railer against the ministry and truth preached’—who ‘can not be sufferit in ane republic.’ He was ordained to be banished from the burgh, with a threat of having his cheeks branded and ears cropped if he should come back.—Ab. C. R.
There are many entries in the Council Record of Aberdeen, shewing that the burgal authorities took upon them to inquire into cases of reckless and disorderly life, and cases where regular communicating at the Lord’s table was neglected. In 1599, one John Hutcheon, a flesher, was threatened with banishment on these accounts.
The kirk-sessions were rigorous in punishing slander and scolding. That of Aberdeen made a statute, in 1562, ordaining a fine for slander, ‘and gif the injurious person be simple and of puir degree, he sall ask forgiveness before the congregation of God and the party, and say: “Tongue, ye lied,” for the first fault, for the second sall be put in the cockstool, and for the third fault sall be banished the town.’ The same body ordained at the same time that ‘all common scolds, flyters, and bards be banished the town, and not to be suffered to remain therein for nae request;’ bards being strolling rhymers, who were felt in those days as an oppression much the same as sturdy beggars.
At the Perth kirk-session, August 4, 1578, ‘Catherine Yester and John Denite were poinded each in half a merk for flyting, while John Tod, for slandering, was ordained to pay a like sum, and stand in the irons two hours, besides asking Margaret Cunningham forgiveness.’ In May 1579, Thomas Malcolm was fined and imprisoned for ‘having called Thomas Brown loon carle.’ In August of the same year, it was ordained that such as were convicted of flyting, and not willing ‘to pass to the Cross-head [that is, to be exposed on the Cross], according to the act passed before, should pay half a merk money to the poor, besides that other half-merk mentioned in the act of before.’ Subsequently the session gave up this leniency, and finally returned to it again. ‘Money,’ it has been remarked, ‘must have been of great value at that time, when so small a sum was proposed as the price of exemption from a most shameful punishment.’
April 25, 1586, the kirk-session of Perth has this minute: ‘Forasmeikle as John Macwalter and Alison Brice his spouse have been sundry and divers times called before the assembly for troubling their neighbours, and especially for backbiting and slandering of Robert Dun and his wife, and of Malcolm Ferguson and his wife, and presently are convicted of the crimes laid to their charge by Robert Dun and Malcolm Ferguson; therefore it is ordained, first, that the said John Macwalter and his wife be put in ward until the time repentance be found in them for their slanderous life; secondly, they shall come to the place where they made the offence, and there on their knees crave pardon of the offence committed, at the persons whom they have offended; thirdly, they shall pay a sufficient penalty to the poor, according to the act made against flyters; lastly, if they ever be found in word or deed hereafter to offend any neighbour, the bare accusation shall be a sufficient plea of conviction, that so the act made against flyters be extended against them, and finally to be banished the town for ever.’
November 2, 1589, the act against slandering was put in force at Perth, on an occasion where we should have little expected it. ‘Forasmeikle as this day was assigned to certain honest neighbours of Tirsappie[268] to be present, and of their conscience to declare if it was true that Guddal, spouse to Richard Watson, was ane witch, as John Watson then alleged, or what evil likelihood they saw in her—Walter Watson, John Cowing, George Scott, James Scott, being inquired severally, as they would answer to God, what they knew, altogether agreed in one without contradiction, that they saw never such things into her whereby they might suspect her of the same, but that she was ane honest poor woman, who wrought honestly for her living, without whose help her husband, Richard Watson, would have been dead, who was ane old aged man: therefore the minister and elders ordain the act of slander to be put in execution against the said John Watson and Helen Watson his daughter.’
[TRAITS OF THE PUBLIC ECONOMY.]
At Aberdeen, in a time of scarcity in 1579, the transportation of victual by sea to other parts of the realm was forbidden. In 1583, it was forbidden to take any sums of money from merchants in other towns ‘to buy wares and salmon, against the common weal.’ The exportation of sheep-skins to Flanders was at this time prohibited, Edinburgh, Perth, and Dundee having done the like. In 1584, a severe fine is imposed on all who should buy grain on its way to market, ‘whilk is the occasion of great dearth, and the cause that the poor commons of this burgh are misservit.’ A statute aiming at the same object was passed in 1598, because such enormities could no longer be sustained ‘without the imminent peril and wrack of this commonwealth.’
In September 1584, when the pest raged in divers parts of the realm, the Aberdeen authorities ordered a port to be built on the bridge of Dee, and other ports to be built at entrances to the town, in order to check the entrance of persons who might bring the infection. In May of the ensuing year, the danger becoming more extreme, the magistrates erected gibbets, ‘ane at the mercat-cross, ane other at the brig of Dee, and the third at the haven mouth, that in case ony infectit person arrive or repair by sea or land to this burgh, or in case ony indweller of this burgh receive, house, or harbour, or give meat or drink to the infectit person or persons, the man to be hangit, and the woman to be drownit.’ Frequent notices occur in the Aberdeen Council Records of precautions adopted on similar occasions: yet it is remarkable, that in an act of council on the subject in 1603, it is mentioned that ‘it has pleasit the guidness of God of his infinite mercy to withhald the said plague frae this burgh thir fifty-five years bygane.’
October 8, 1593, the magistrates of Aberdeen found it necessary to take order with ‘a great number of idle persons, not having land nor masters, neither yet using ony lawful merchandise, craft, nor occupation, fleeing as appears frae their awn dwelling, by reason of some unlawful causes and odious crimes whereof they are culpable, whilk are very contagious enemies to the common weal of this burgh.’ The town was ordered to be cleared of them, and their future harbourage by the inhabitants was forbidden.
In those days, and for a long time subsequently, there was no regular post for the transmission of letters in Scotland. When there was pressing or important business calling for a transmission of letters to a distance, a special messenger had to be despatched with them at a considerable expense. The city of Aberdeen seems to have kept a particular officer, called the Common Post, for this duty; and in September 1595, this individual, named ‘Alexander Taylor, alias Checkum,’ was ordered by the magistrates a livery of blue, with the town’s arms on his left arm. Other persons were occasionally employed, and the town’s disbursements on this ground continue to occupy a prominent place in its accounts down to 1650, if not later.
In 1574, a general assembly of the inhabitants agreed to weekly collections for the native poor, according to a roll formerly made with their own consents, ‘except they wha pleases to augment their promise.’ It was at the same time decreed that beggars not native should be removed, while those born in the town should wear ‘the town’s taiken on their outer garment, whereby they may be known.’ In 1587, the council, ‘having consideration of the misorder and tumult of the puir folks sitting at the kirk-door begging almous, plucking and pulling honest men’s gowns, cloaks, and abulyment,’ ordained the repression of the nuisance. Eight years thereafter, January 23, 1595-6, there was another public meeting, at which it was agreed to arrange the poor in four classes—‘babes, decayed persons householders, lame and impotent persons, and sic as were auld and decrepit.’ Individuals agreed to take each man ‘ane babe’ into his own house, and a quarterly collection for the rest was agreed to; begging to be suppressed.
September 2, 1596, the council took into consideration a petition of ‘Maister Quentin Prestoun, professor of physic, craving at them the liberty and benefit, in respect of his debility, being somewhat stricken in age, and sae not able to accomplish the duty without ane coadjutor, to entertain ane apothecar and his apothecary-shop, for the better furnishing of this burgh and of the country, of all sorts of physical and chirurgical medicaments.’ The request was granted during the will of the council.
April 6, 1599, four fleshers in Aberdeen were fined for contravening the acts of parliament which forbade that ‘ony flesh should be slain or eaten frae the first day of March inclusive to the first day of May exclusive.’
1601. Feb.
1601.
Among the violences of the age, what would now be called agrarian outrages were very common. Sometimes it was a pretender to proprietorship who came in to trouble the tenants of the landlord in possession; sometimes a tenant was the object of wrathful jealousy among persons of his own class. Of the former order of troubles we have an example at this time, in a charge brought before the Privy Council (February 19, 1601) against David Hamilton, younger, of Bothwell-haugh, ‘servant to the Laird of Innerwick.’ It was for the turning out of his wife from Woodhouselee, that Hamilton of Bothwell-haugh murdered the Good Regent. We now see his representative breaking other laws on account of the same lands.[269] Sir James Bellenden of Broughton, who was landlord de facto, complains against David Hamilton, that, with a company ‘bodin and furnist in feir of weir,’ he had come, on the 10th of February instant, to the tenants of the lands of Woodhouselee, ‘where they were in peaceable and quiet maner at their plews,’ and there assailed them with furious speeches, ‘threatening to have their lives gif they insistit in manuring and lawboring of the said lands,’ and actually compelled them through fear to give up their work. As David failed to appear and answer this charge, letters were ordered to denounce him as a rebel.
Before a month elapsed, the Council had under its attention a still more violent affair, forming a specimen of the second class of outrages. The complainer here is Patrick Monypenny of Pilrig—an estate with an old manor-house situated between Edinburgh and Leith. Patrick states that he was of mind to have set that part of his lands of Pilrig, called the Round-haugh, to Harry Robertson and Andrew Alis, to his utility and profit. But on a certain day not specified, David Duff, indweller in Leith, came to these persons, and uttered furious menaces against them in the event of their occupying these lands, so that they had departed from their purpose of occupying them. Duff, accompanied with two men named Matheson, had also, on the 2d March instant, attacked the servants of Monypenny, as they were labouring the lands in question, with similar speeches, threatening their lives if they persisted in working there; and at night, they, or some persons hounded out by them, had come and broken their plough, and thrown it into the river. ‘John Matheson, after the breaking of the complenar’s plew, come to John Porteous’s house, his tenant, and bad him gang now betwix the plew stilts, and see how she wald gang while [till] the morn.’ To this was added a threat to break his head if he should ever say that Duff had broken his plough. ‘Likeas the said David sinsyne come to the complenar’s lands, being tilled, and trampit and cast the tilled furs down, thus committing manifest oppression upon the complainant.’ In this case, the accused persons were assoilzied, but only, it would appear, by hard swearing in their own cause.
Apr. 15. 1601.
Apr. 17.
‘The king’s majesty came to Perth, and was made burgess at the mercat-cross. There was ane puncheon of wine set there, and all drucken out. He receivit the banquet frae the town, and subscribit the guild book with his awn hand—“Jacobus Rex: parcere subjectis, et debellare superbos.”’—Chron. Perth.
John Watt, Deacon of the deacons in Edinburgh, or he would have latterly been called Convener of the Trades, was shot dead on the Burgh-moor. This was the same gallant official who raised the trades for the protection of the king at the celebrated tumult of the 17th December 1596. One Alexander Slummon, a by-stander, was tried for the murder, but found innocent. We are told by Calderwood that Watt, having offered to invade the person of the minister, Robert Bruce, was well liked by the king, who accordingly was exact in regard to Slummon’s trial. The historian also relates that ‘the judgment threatened against this man by Mr Robert Bruce came to pass.’ Such threatenings or prognostications of judgments are of course very likely to bring their own fulfilment.
Apr. 24.
‘Sundry Jesuits, seminary priests, and trafficking papists, enemies to God’s truth and all Christian government,’ were stated to be at this time ‘daily creeping within the country,’ with the design, ‘by their godless practices, not only to disturb the estate of the true religion, but also his hieness’ awn estate, and the common quietness of the realm.’—P. C. R.
William Barclay, a new-made advocate, brother of Sir Patrick Barclay of Tollie, was tried in Edinburgh for the crime of being present at ‘twa messes whilk were said by Mr Alex. M‘Whirrie, ane Jesuit priest, within Andro Napier’s dwelling-house in Edinburgh,’ aggravated by perjury, he having some time before sworn and subscribed before the presbytery of Edinburgh, that he was of the religion presently professed within the realm. The culprit was declared infamous, and banished from the country, ‘never to return to the same, unless, by satisfaction of the kirk, he obtain our special licence to that effect.’—Pit. Cal.
A week later, Malcolm Laing and Henry Gibson, servants of the Marquis of Huntly, confessing their having been present ‘at the late mass within the burgh of Edinburgh,’ were adjudged by the Council to banishment for life. At the same time, two female servants of the marchioness having made similar confession, the Council, ‘seeing their remaining with the said marquesse may procure a forder sclander to the kirk,’ ordained that her ladyship should remove them from her company, and no more receive them, under pain of rebellion.
Apr. 27.
1601.
‘... Archibald Cornwall, town-officer, hangit at the Cross, and hung on the gibbet twenty-four hours; and the cause wherefore he was hangit—He being an unmerciful greedy creature, he poindit ane honest man’s house, and among the rest, he poindit the king and queen’s pictures; and when he came to the Cross to comprise the same, he hung them up upon twa nails on the same gallows to be comprisit; and they being seen, word gaed to the king and queen, whereupon he was apprehendit and hangit.’—Bir.
Cornwall sustained a regular trial before a jury, eight of whom were tailors. The dittay bears that ‘in treasonable contempt and disdain of his majesty, he stood up upon ane furm or buird, beside the gibbet, and called [drove] ane nail therein, as heich as he could reach it, and lifted up his hieness’ portraitor foresaid, and held the same upon the gibbet, pressing to have hung the same thereon, and to have left it there, as an ignominious spectacle to the haill world, gif he had not been stayed by the just indignation of the haill people, menacing to stane him dead, and pulling him perforce frae the gibbet.’
The punishment goes so monstrously beyond the apparent offence, that one is led to suspect something which does not appear. The ‘honest man’ whose goods were taken might be a known friend of the king, while Cornwall was known to be the reverse. It was perhaps inferred that the ‘unmerciful greedy creature’ was only too ready to embrace the opportunity of holding up the king to contempt. These remarks are only meant to suggest motives, not to justify the severity of the punishment.
The gibbet on which the portrait had been hung—as something rendered horrible by that profanity—was ‘taken down and burnt with fire.’
1601.
Apr. 27.
James Wood, fiar—that is, heir—of Bonnington, in Forfarshire, was a Catholic, and received excommunication on that account a few years before. He had at the same time had quarrels with his father regarding questions of property. In March of the present year, he again drew observation upon himself by coming to Edinburgh and attending the mass in Andrew Napier’s house. It was further alleged of him that he had harboured a seminary priest. On the 16th of March, accompanied by his brother-in-law, William Wood of Latoun, by two blacksmiths named Daw, and some other persons, he broke into his father’s house, and took therefrom certain legal papers belonging to the Lady Usen, besides a quantity of clothes, napery, and blankets. The circumstances connected with this act, did we know them, would probably extenuate the criminality. The father made no movement to prosecute his son. He was, however, tried along with Wood of Latoun before an assize in Edinburgh; when both were found guilty, and condemned to be hanged. Wood of Latoun obtained a remission, and great interest was made for the principal culprit by the Catholic nobles, Huntly, Errol, and Home. James might have listened favourably, and been content, as in Kincaid’s case, with a good fine payable ‘to us and our treasurer;’ but ‘the ministers were instant with the king, to have a proof of his sincerity:’ so says Calderwood, without telling us whether it was his sincerity against papists or his sincerity against malefactors in general that was meant. The young man regarded himself, by admission of the same author, as suffering for the Catholic religion—though, perhaps, he only meant that, but for his being a papist, his actual guilt would not have been punished so severely. He was beheaded at the Cross at six o’clock in the morning, ‘ever looking for pardon to the last gasp.’—Pit. Cal. Bir.
May.
The General Assembly arranged that certain ministers should go to the Catholic nobles, Huntly, Errol, Angus, Home, and Herries, and plant themselves in their families for the purpose of converting them from their errors. These ministers were to labour at all times for this object by preaching, reading, and expounding, and by purging the said houses of profane and scandalous persons. They were also to catechise their families twice a day, ‘till they attain some good reasonable measure of knowledge.’—Row.
It fully appears that this arrangement was carried into effect. We find in 1604 that Lord Gordon, the eldest son of the Marquis of Huntly, and the Master of Caithness, eldest son of the Earl of Caithness, were being brought up together, under the care of two pedagogues, Thomas Gordon and John Sinclair, who were compelled to declare themselves adherents of the reformed faith, and examined as to the nature of the religious instructions which they imparted. John Sinclair admitted that, in France, he had gone to mass, but only for the purpose of seeing the king there. The mass itself he professed to ‘abhor and detest frae his heart.’ The two pedagogues stated that they instructed the two young nobles in grammar and oratory, and on Sunday trained them by a little catechism, besides reading and expounding of the New Testament.—A. P. R.
1601.
In 1609, to insure that the sons of noblemen sent abroad under preceptors, should not be liable to have their religious convictions perverted, it was enacted by parliament that no preceptor could lawfully undertake such a duty without a licence from the bishop of his diocese.
June.
An effort was made at this time by the burghs to introduce a cloth-manufacture into Scotland. Seven Flemings were engaged to settle in the country, in order to set the work agoing, six of them being for says, and the seventh for broadcloth. When the men came, expecting to be immediately set to work in Edinburgh, a delay arose while it was debated whether they should not be dispersed among the principal towns, in order to diffuse their instructions as widely as possible. We find the strangers on the 28th of July, complaining to the Privy Council that they were neither entertained nor set to work, and that it was proposed to sunder them, ‘whilk wald be a grit hinder to the perfection of the wark.’
The Council decreed that ‘the haill strangers brought hame for this errand sall be halden together within the burgh of Edinburgh, and put to work conform to the conditions past betwix the said strangers and the commissioners wha dealt with them.’ Meanwhile, till they should begin their work, the Council ordained ‘the bailies of Edinburgh to entertene them in meat and drink,’ though this should be paid back to them by the other burghs, and the strangers were at the same time to be allowed to undertake any other work for their own benefit.—P. C. R.
On the 11th of September, the burghs had done nothing to ‘effectuat the claith working,’ and the Council declared that unless they should have made a beginning by Michaelmas, the royal privilege would be withdrawn.
Aug.
1601.
The bare, half-moorish uplands of Buchan, in Aberdeenshire, are varied, on the course of the river Ythan, by a deep woody dell, on the edge of which is perched an ancient baronial castle, named Gight. Here dwelt a branch of the noble house of Huntly—the Gordons of Gight—noted in modern literary history by reason of the heiress, in whom the line ended, having thrown herself and her family property into the arms of a certain spendthrift named Byron, by whom she became the mother of one who flourished as the most noted poet of his day.[270] The old castellated house in which these lairds lived, and the moderate estate which gave them subsistence, have for seventy years been part of the possessions of the Earl of Aberdeen, for whose visitors the ruined walls and the wildering dell are now merely matters of holiday interest.[271] At the time of which we are speaking, the Laird of Gight was a personage of some local importance, a baron of the house of Gordon, a noted supporter of the marquis in all his enterprises; above all, a man deeply offensive to the government of his day, on account of his obstinate adherence to popery.
The kirk had levelled its artillery at George Gordon, the young laird, for a long time in vain; he had always hitherto contrived to put them off with fair promises. Now at length the presbytery of Aberdeen met in a stern mood, and appeared as if it would be trifled with no longer. Gordon, feeling that his means of resistance were failing, wrote a pleading letter to the reverend court, telling how he was deadly diseased, and unable to leave the country, but was willing, if agreeable to them, to confine himself within a mile of his own house, ‘and receipt nane wha is excommunicat (my bedfellow excepted);’ or he would go into confinement anywhere else, and confer with Protestant clergymen as soon as his sickness would permit. ‘I persuade myself,’ he adds, ‘you will nocht be hasty in pronouncing the sentence of excommunication against me, for I knaw undoubtedly that sentence will prejudge my warldly estate, and will be ane great motive to you in the kirk of Scotland to crave my blude.’ He concludes: ‘If it shall please his majesty and your wisdoms of the Kirk of Scotland sae to tak my blude for my profession, whilk is Catholic Roman, I will maist willingly offer it; and, gif sae be, God grant me constancy to abide the same.’ This letter proved unsatisfactory to the court, seeing it ‘made nae offer that micht move them to stay from the excommunication.’ Therefore, the court in one voice concluded that, unless Gordon came forward in eight days with sufficient surety for either subscribing or departing, he should be excommunicated without further delay.
1601.
While thus appearing as willing to be martyrs for religious principle, the Gight Gordons were no better in secular morality than many of the Presbyterian leaders of the past age. Indeed, they appear to have been men of fully as wild and passionate temper as their descendant, the mother of the poet. Having, for some reason which does not appear, a spite at Magnus Mowat of Balquhollie, the laird and two of his younger sons had, in June this year, gone with a large armed and mounted company to his lands, and destroyed all the growing crops. Following upon this, they conceived mortal wrath against Alexander Copeland and Ralph Ainslie, inhabitants of the village of Turriff, probably in consequence of some circumstances in connection with the above outrage. On the 18th of July, John Gordon, the second son, came to Turriff with a friend and a servant, and, attacking these men with deadly weapons, wounded the latter past hope of his life. The minister came out and interfered in behalf of peace, promising that the whole inhabitants should be answerable for any injury the men had done. But though the Gordons left the village for the time, they returned in greater strength at midnight—and on this occasion both the laird and his eldest son were present—broke into the house of William Duffus, and bringing him forth to the street ‘sark-allane,’ there had nearly taken his life by firing at him a charge of small-shot.
Alexander Chalmer, messenger, went on the 27th of September to deliver letters to the Laird of Gight and others, commanding them to appear and answer for these frightful outrages. He was returning quietly from the house, ‘lippening for nae harm or pursuit,’ when he found himself followed by a number of armed servants, and was presently seized and dragged before the laird. The ferocious baron clapped a pistol to the man’s breast, and seemed of intent to shoot him, when some one mercifully put aside the weapon. ‘He then harlit him within his hall, took the copy of the said letters, whilk he supposed to have been the principal letters, and cast them in a dish of broe [broth], and forcit the officer to sup and swallow them,’ holding a dagger at the heart all the time. Afterwards, the laird, being informed that the principal letters were yet extant, ‘came to the officer in a new rage and fury, rave the principal letters out of his sleeve, rave them in pieces, and cast them in the fire.’
1601.
When King James was at Brechin in the latter part of October, the Laird of Gight failing to appear to answer for these outrages, a horning was launched against him. At the same time, the young laird was accused of having reset John Hamilton, a notorious trafficking Jesuit, and was commanded to enter himself in ward in Montrose on that account. Surety was given that he would do so. A few days later, the Privy Council took into consideration the Turriff outrages, and commissioned the Earl of Errol to raise a body of men in arms to proceed against the Gordons and their abettors, but not till the 15th of November. How the matter ended, does not appear; but for further matters concerning the Gight Gordons, see under date 20th January 1607.
Sep. or Oct.
Among the many men of name pursuing lawless and violent courses, one of the most noted was George Meldrum, younger, of Dumbreck. In 1599, he set upon his brother Andrew at the Milltown of Dumbreck, and wounded him grievously, after which he carried him away, and detained him as a prisoner for several weeks. In the ensuing year, he had committed a similar attack upon Andrew Meldrum of Auchquharties, conveying him as a malefactor from Aberdeenshire to the house of one Fyfe, on the Burgh-moor of Edinburgh, where he was kept several days, and till he contrived to make his escape. Law and private vengeance were alike devoid of terror to this young bravo, who seems never to have had any difficulty in procuring associates to assist him in his outrageous proceedings.
1601.
About the time here noted, he entered upon an enterprise partaking of the romantic, and which has actually been the subject of ballad celebration, though under a mistake as to his name and condition in life. Mr Alexander Gibson, one of the clerks of Session, and who subsequently was eminent as a judge under the designation of Lord Durie, was, for some reason which does not appear, honoured with the malice of young Dumbreck. Possibly, there was some legal case pending or concluded in which Gibson stood opposed to the interests of the brigand. However it was, Gibson was living quietly at St Andrews—he being a landed gentleman of Fife—when Meldrum, tracking him by a spy, learned one day that he was riding with a friend and a servant on the water-side opposite Dundee. Accompanied by a suitable party, consisting of two Jardines, a Johnston—border thieves, probably—one called John Kerr, son to the Tutor of Graden, and Alexander Bartilmo, with two foot-boys, all armed with sword, hagbuts, and pistols, he set upon Mr Gibson and his friend in a furious manner, compelling them to surrender to him as prisoners; after which he robbed them of their purses, containing about three hundred merks in gold and silver, and hurried them southward to the ferry of Kinghorn. There, having liberated the friend and servant, he conducted Mr Gibson across the Firth of Forth, probably using some means, such as muffling of the face, to prevent his prisoner from being recognised. At least, we can scarcely suppose that, even in that turbulent age, it would have been possible otherwise to conduct so important and well-known a man as an involuntary prisoner to the house of William Kay in Leith, and thence past the palace of Holyroodhouse through the whole county of Edinburgh, and thence again to Melrose, for such was the course they took. Before entering Melrose, Meldrum divided the money they had taken between himself and his accomplices, each getting about twenty merks. He then conducted Mr Gibson across the Border, landing him in the castle of Harbottle, which appears to have then been the residence of one George Ratcliff; and here the stolen lawyer was kept in strict durance for eight days.[272] We may here adopt something of the traditionary story, as preserved by Sir Walter Scott: ‘He was imprisoned and solitary; receiving his food through an aperture in the wall, and never hearing the sound of a human voice save when a shepherd called his dog by the name of Batty, and when a female domestic called upon Madge, the cat. These, he concluded, were invocations of spirits, for he held himself to be in the dungeon of a sorcerer.’[273]
1601.
How Mr Gibson was liberated, we do not learn. During his absence, his wife and children mourned him as dead.[274] George Meldrum contrived, in November 1603, to gain forcible possession of his brother Andrew’s house of Dumbreck; and there he hoped to set law at defiance. The case, however, was too clamant to allow of his escaping in this manner. A party of his majesty’s guard being sent to Aberdeen for his capture, the citizens added a force of sixteen men, with a commander, and then a regular siege was established round the den of the outlaw. Being compelled to submit, he was carried to Edinburgh; and subjected to a trial, which ended in his having the head struck from his body at the Cross, January 12, 1604.
Oct.
At this time, Aberdeen was visited by a company of players, who bore the title of the ‘king’s servants,’ and had come ‘recommended by his majesty’s special letter.’ They performed ‘comedies and stage-plays,’ according to the somewhat awkward report of the town-council record, where it is stated that the provost, bailies, and council ordained a present to them of thirty-two merks, equal to about 35s. 6d. sterling. On the 22d of October, thirteen days after the ordinance for this gift, the council conferred the freedom of the burgh—the highest mark of honour they had it in their power to bestow—upon a batch of strangers, among whom were Sir Francis Hospital, a French nobleman, and several Scottish gentlemen of rank and importance; among whom, also, was ‘Lawrence Fletcher, comedian to his majesty,’ being apparently the chief of the histrionic company then performing in the city.
1601. Nov. 20.
This fact has an extrinsic interest, on account of Fletcher being known to have belonged to the company of players in London which included the immortal Shakspeare. About eighteen months after this time, May 1603, immediately after James VI. arrived in London to take possession of the English throne, he granted a patent in favour of the players acting at the Globe Theatre, ‘Pro Laurentio Fletcher, Gulielmo Shakspeare, et aliis,’ and which licenses the performances of ‘Lawrence Fletcher, William Shakspeare, Richard Burbage, Augustine Phillips, John Hemings, Henry Condel, William Sly, Robert Armin, Richard Cowley, and the rest of their associates.’ It has therefore been judged as not unlikely that Shakspeare was present on this occasion in Aberdeen, as one of the company of ‘the king’s servants’ headed by Fletcher—a probability which Mr Charles Knight has shewn to be not inconsistent with other facts known regarding Shakspeare’s movements and proceedings about the time, and to be favoured by many passages in the subsequently written tragedy of Macbeth, which argue a more correct and intimate knowledge of Scotland than is usually possessed by individuals who have not visited it.[275]
The presbytery of Aberdeen was occupied with the case of Walter Ronaldson of Kirktown of Dyce, a man who was ‘a diligent hearer of the word, and communicat with the sacrament of the Lord’s Table.’ Walter was brought before the reverend court for ‘familiarity with a spirit.’ He confessed that, twenty-seven years before, ‘there came to his door a spirit, and called upon him, “Wattie, Wattie!” and therefrae removed, and thereafter came to him every year twa times sinsyne, but [he] saw naething.’ At Michaelmas in the bypast year, ‘it came where the deponer was in his bed sleeping, and it sat down anent the bed upon a kist, and callit upon him, saying “Wattie, Wattie!” and then he wakened and saw the form of it, whilk was like ane little body, having a shaven beard, clad in white linen like a sark, and it said to Walter: “Thou art under wrack—gang to the weachman’s house in Stanivoid, and there thou shall find baith silver and gold with vessel.”’ Walter proceeded to say that, in compliance with this direction, he went with some friends and spades to Stanivoid in order to search. He himself was ‘poustless’ [unable to act]; but his friends searched, and found nothing. He expressed his belief, nevertheless, that ‘there is gold there, gif it was weel sought.’ Walter was remitted to his parish minister, ‘to try forder of him.’—A. P. R.
Nov. 24.
The pest was declared to have at this time broken out in the town of Crail in Fife, and in the parishes of Eglesham, Eastwood, and Pollock in Renfrewshire. Orders for secluding the population of those places were, as usual, issued.—P. C. R.
On the 21st of December, the pest was understood to have entered Glasgow. The inhabitants of that city were therefore forbidden to visit Edinburgh.
On the 26th of January 1602, it is stated that the infected families of Crail, being put forth upon the neighbouring moor, and there being no provision for ‘the entertening of the puir and indigent creatures,’ they had wandered throughout the country in quest of food, and thus endangered the spread of the disease. The sheriff of Fife was ordered to see provision made for these people, and to take measures for punishing those who had wandered.
1601.
On the 4th of February, the pestilence was in Edinburgh, and the Court of Session was obliged in consequence to rise. Birrel notes: ‘The 19 of February, John Archibald with his family were taken out to the Burrow-muir, being infectit with the pest.’ Probably others immediately followed. This circumstance brings before us the celebrated John Napier, younger of Merchiston, who, on the 11th of March, complained to the Privy Council that the magistrates having ploughed up and turned to profitable service the place where they used formerly to lodge people infected with the pest, had on this occasion planted the sick in certain yards or parks of his at the Scheens, without any permission being asked. The magistrates did not come forward to defend themselves; nevertheless, the Council, considering the urgency of the demands of the public service, ordained that the lands in question should be left in the hands of the magistrates till next Candlemas, on terms to be agreed upon.
On the 16th of March, the pest still increasing in Edinburgh, the king took thought of Dunfermline, ‘being the ordinar residence of the queen, his dearest spouse, and of their majesties’ bairns,’ and ordained that, for its preservation from the contagion, the passage by the Queensferry should be stopped. He himself seems to have at the same time gone north to Brechin, where we find the Privy Council held for some weeks.
The 20th of May was ‘ane solemn day of fasting and thanksgiving for his merciful deliverance of the pest.’—Bir.
Nov. 26.
Owing to the influence of the noble family of Maxwell, popery had a great harbourage in the town of Dumfries. At this time denunciations were launched against sundry gentlemen connected with the place—William, Lord Herries; John, Master of Herries; Walter Herries of Knockshinnan, Edward Maxwell of the Hills, John Herries in Braco, Robert Herries in Killiloch, Adam Corsan, John Corsan, Robert Carran, John Horner, Matthew Forsyth, John Gibson, Robert Ka, Patrick Ka, Mr John Maxwell, and upwards of a dozen more, charging them with contravening sundry ‘guid and loveable acts of parliament and secret council’ against saying and hearing of mass, and entertaining priests. Mr John Hamilton, and Mr William Brown, sometime commendator of New Abbey, had been kept amongst them, and they had heard these men say mass, and allowed them to baptise some children, to the displeasure of God, and contempt of the king and his laws. For these reasons they were summoned to appear and answer, under pain of rebellion.—P. C. R.
1601.
On the 24th of December, sixteen of the men who had been summoned, including Lord Herries, appeared. For some others a certification was presented, that they were prevented by infirmity from travelling. Those who appeared were asked to declare upon their oath what they knew about the matters in the charge; and on their refusing to do so, they were ordained to be kept in ward in Edinburgh till they should be tried for their alleged offence. The others were again summoned.
These, on the 14th of January, the day appointed for their appearing, failed to appear, and were denounced as rebels.
Dec. 11.
Great hatred and strife had now lasted for some years between the Earl of Cassillis[276] and Sir Thomas Kennedy of Colzean, on the one side, and the Laird of Bargeny, the Laird of Blairwhan, the Laird of Girvanmains, and some other Carrick gentlemen, on the other. The crafty Laird of Auchindrain, though professedly reconciled to Sir Thomas Kennedy,[277] was mainly on the side of Bargeny, who was his brother-in-law. It is believed that he employed himself to inflate Bargeny, who was but a youth, with ambitious designs, making him believe that he could easily put himself on a level with the Earl of Cassillis. The king made an effort to reconcile the parties, but it had no permanent effect. For some time these Carrick chieftains were chiefly busied in devising plots against each other’s lives. On one occasion, the earl, having been induced to accept the hospitality of the Laird of Blairwhan, was apprised that certain of his unfriends, along with Blairwhan, intended to murder him in his bed; he therefore left the house by a back-door, and made his way by night to Maybole. On another occasion, with the consent of Bargeny, the Laird of Benand, with some associates, lay in ambush in the kiln of Daljarrock, in which they had made holes for their hagbuts, designing to shoot Lord Cassillis as he passed that way. Receiving timely warning, he escaped the danger by going his journey by another road.
1601.
On the 6th of December 1601, the Laird of Bargeny had occasion to go to Ayr on business. Along with him rode his brother and the Laird of Benand—the two leaders in the affair of the kiln—and ten or twelve other horsemen. Passing within a quarter of a mile of Cassillis Castle, and not stopping to pay their respects to the earl, they violated one of the most sacred of the social laws then existing. Lord Cassillis could interpret it into nothing but the grossest insult. He was the more enraged, knowing that Bargeny’s two principal companions had lately lain in wait for his life. He immediately took measures for gathering his friends about him, and sent spies to Ayr to apprise him of all Bargeny’s movements.
After spending four or five days in Ayr, Bargeny proposed to return to his own house, much against the advice of his friends, who feared dangers by the way. Setting out with a company of about eighty on horseback, in the midst of a dense snow-storm, he made a halt at the Bridge of Doon—that place since made so famous from another cause—and there addressed his people, protesting that he sought no quarrel with Lord Cassillis, but expressing his hope that, if attacked, they would stand around him, and do their duty as became men of honour. They all assured him that they would die in his defence. He then divided his train into two parties, and riding on, at the Lady Cross met the earl, who came out of Maybole with fully two hundred men. ‘Being all ready to meet, the ane on the Teind knowe, and the other on the next, within the shot of ane musket, they began to flyte [use despiteful language towards each other]. Patrick Rippet [of the earl’s party], cryit: “Laird of Benand! Laird of Benand! Laird of Benand! This is I, Patrick Rippet, that took thy [hagbut]. Come down here in the holm, and break ane tree for thy love’s sake!” But the other gave nae answer, albeit he had given the laird stiff council to ride forward before.’
1601.
The Laird of Bargeny, anxious still to avoid fighting if possible, led off his men along the side of a bog; but the Cassillis party came by the other side, and met him at the bottom. He then made a dash forward across a ditch, with Mure of Auchindrain, his page, and three other gentlemen, but, not being supported by any others, found himself outnumbered by the enemy. A brief conflict took place, in which the laird and his friends did some damage to the opposite party; but it was all in vain. Auchindrain was wounded, the page was killed, one of his friends unhorsed, and another sore hurt. He himself, though but one of his friends remained, was not daunted, but rode rapidly into the ranks of the enemy, calling: ‘Where is my lord himself? Let him now keep promise and break ane tree!’ He was instantly set upon by a host of the earl’s friends, who strake at him with swords, and bore him back by sheer force. At that moment, one John Dick, who had formerly received benefits at his hands, thrust a lance through his throat and stopped his breath. The poor gentleman was then borne off by his horse towards such of his party as still stood their ground, and fell at their feet. The skirmish being now at an end, they were allowed to conduct him away from the field, taking him first to a barn at a place called Dingham, then to Maybole, and finally to Ayr, where he soon after died, being but twenty-five years of age, leaving a widow and two children to bewail his bloody end. ‘He was,’ says the contemporary historian of the Kennedies, ‘the brawest man that was to be gotten in ony land; of hich stature and weel made; his hair black, but of ane comely face; the brawest horseman, and the ae-best of mony at all pastimes ... gif he had [had] time to [have] had experience to his wit, he had been by his marrows [superior to all his mates].’
The procedure consequent on this sad tragedy is very notable. The Countess of Cassillis—a lady much the senior of her husband, the widow of the late Chancellor Maitland, and of course well acquainted with all the principal people around the king—rode immediately to court, to intercede for James’s favour towards her lord. With the help of the Laird of Colzean, she contrived to obtain an act of Council, making the earl’s part in the late conflict ‘good service to the king’—the pretext being that, in the opposite party, was Thomas Kennedy, Bargeny’s brother, a denounced rebel. ‘The ten thousand merks given to the treasurer was what did the turn.‘[278] The earl was able afterwards to reimburse himself by causing all the gentlemen who had been with Bargeny to come to him and purchase remissions for their concern in the death of one of his followers, slain in the skirmish.
‘The Lady Bargeny rade to Edinburgh, and made her complent to the king and queen, but was little better, or least but heard; for she was compellit to buy the ward of her son, and to give thirteen thousand merks for the same.’ It is alleged that she afterwards used all the means she could to take the life of Lord Cassillis, in revenge for her husband’s death. An ambush was laid for him at Monkton, but getting timely warning, he waited for an increase to his retinue, by which he overawed the intending assassins. Lady Bargeny died in 1605, on her way home from London, whither she had gone to consult Dr Martin for ‘the eittik’ [that is, hectic, meaning a pulmonary consumption]. Her body was met at Sanquhar by ‘the haill friends of the house,’ and by them brought ceremonially to Ayr, and placed beside her deceased husband in the church. She had, however, erected a sumptuous tomb to her lord in the church of Ballantrae, and to this the two bodies were transferred with great state, ‘the honours and all the rest being preparit very honourably.’ By this is meant, a procession bearing the escutcheon, pencil of honour, sword, helmet, corslet, &c., of the deceased. ‘The day being come, there was of noblemen the Earls of Eglinton, Abercorn, and Winton, with the Lords Semple, Cathcart, Loudoun, and Ochiltree, the Lairds of Bombie, Blairwhan, and Gairland [Garthland], with ane great number whilk I will not mint [attempt] to express; his honours being borne by the Guidman of Ardmillan, the Guidman of Kirkhill, with sundry mae of the friends; his sister’s son, Young Auchindrain, bearing the Banner of Revenge, whereon was paintit his portraiture, with all his wounds, with his son sitting at his knees, and this ditty written betwixt his hands: “Judge and Revenge my Cause, O Lord!” And sae, conveyit to Ayr, bure all very honourably, to the number of ane thousand horse, of gentlemen, and laid in the foresaid tomb.’—Hist. Ken.
It is scarcely necessary to remark the amount of local means here indicated by a funeral train of a thousand mounted gentlemen. The Banner of Revenge seems to have been an imitation of that carried in the streets of Edinburgh in June 1567, to inflame the popular mind against Queen Mary.
1602.
The winter of 1601-2 is described by Birrel as of unheard-of severity and duration. It lasted from the 1st of November to the 1st of May. In February was a ten-days’ snow-fall.[279] The Earl of Sutherland was at this time travelling with his ordinary train from Golspie through the glen of Loth, on his way to Killeirnan. The ground being already deeply covered with snow, the party found themselves in a hard plight, when a fresh storm burst upon them, driving thick snow full in their faces. The like was not seen for many years after. ‘Some of the company being thirsty, drank aquavitæ, which by chance happened to be there. This made them afterwards so feeble, that they were not able to endure against the storm.’ This is an observation in conformity with a statement of Sir John Franklin respecting his men when travelling in the frozen regions. Spirituous liquor, according to him, did no one any good. The earl, being strong, made his way through the snow, and such of his company as kept close together near him were safe. ‘Some were dispersed by the extremity of the tempest; some were carried home upon their fellows’ shoulders, and recovered afterwards.’ Several others, including the earl’s harper, were found dead in the snow next morning.—G. H. S.
Feb. 14.
James and George Vallam, sons of David Vallam of Woodwrae, were hanged in Edinburgh for stouthrief. The dittay reveals some of the practices of the age. These two men had, in June 1596, attacked two cadgers or carriers at the Cot-town of Melgum in Forfarshire, as they were ‘driving seven packs of merchant geir on seven horses towards Brechin, to the fair thereof,’ and did ‘thiftously and masterfully convey the same away with them, together with the said cadgers, to the mouth of Glenmoy, and disponed upon a grit part of the said merchant geir at their pleasure.’ The circumstances are precisely what might occur at the present day in Spain.—Pit.
Feb. 26.
1602.
After such a variety of examples of violence in the south and west provinces, where a comparative civilisation prevailed, it may be curious to see an example of the outrages occasionally committed in the north. On this day, if we are to believe the statement of the suffering party, the house of Moy, belonging to John Campbell, commissary of Inverness, was attacked, despoiled, and utterly destroyed by a party under command of Alexander M’Ranald of Glengarach. They came ‘to the number of three score persons,[280] all thieves, broken men, and sorners of clans, bodin and furnist with bows, habershons, twa-handit swords, and other weapons invasive, and with hagbuts and pistolets.’ Reaching Moy ‘upon fair daylicht,’ they ‘divided their company in twa several companies, ane whereof remainit about the complenar’s house and biggings, where they treasonably and awfully raisit fire, burnt and destroyit his haill house, onsets, and biggings; consisting of ane hall, twa chalmers, ane kitchen, ane stable, and ane barn, and some other office-houses; together with his haill corns being in the barn and barn-yard, extending to twa grit stacks of aits, ane stack of wheat, and ane grit stack of beir, after they had spulyit, reft, and intromittit with his haill insicht plenishing’.
The other company ‘past to the house of umwhile James Buchan, the complenar’s tenant, where they first spulyit his house, guids, and geir, and then treasonably raisit fire therein.... They took James Buchan, Patrick Buchan his son, and Robert Anderson his servant, and having cuttit off their legs and arms, and otherwise dismemberit them at their pleasure, they cast them quick in the fire and burnt them.... In their departing, they reft and away-took with them twenty oxen and three score sheep pertening to the complenar, and wrackit and herryit his haill puir tenants. The like of whilk barbarous cruelty committit sae fer within the in-country has sendil been heard of.’
All that could be immediately done in this frightful case was to denounce the guilty parties as rebels for not appearing to answer Campbell’s complaint. Soon after, we find the Privy Council expressing its grief that the broken men of the Highlands, ‘not content with the robbery and reif whilk they were accustomed to commit upon the borders of the country, have tane the bauldness in troops to repair in fair daylicht within the heart of the in-country and to the ports of Elgin, whilk was the maist peaceable and obedient part of the haill land, and there to herry and sorn at their pleasure.’ The gentlemen of Morayshire were summoned to advise with his majesty, as to the best means of restraining this insolence.—P. C. R.
There is afterwards (June 28), a complaint by Campbell of Moy as to the favour and entertainment which Dunbar of Westfield, sheriff of Moray, had given to the men by whom his estate was despoiled. It was even alleged that the Dunbars had brought the broken men into the country. This group of men accordingly had some trouble about this business, but not any of serious consequence. We do not find that any of the actual perpetrators of the outrage at Moy ever suffered for it.
Apr. 8.
1602.
Thomas Musgrave, Captain of Bewcastle, being accused before the Privy Council of England, of sundry breaches of duty, particularly of having made Bewcastle a den of thieves, and open to the Scots at their pleasure, challenged the accuser, one Lancelot Carleton, to the trial by combat on Canonbie Holm, ‘before England and Scotland,’ on Thursday in Easter-week, being the 8th of April 1602, betwixt nine o’clock and one of the same day. It was agreed that they should fight on foot, armed with jack, steel-cap, plait sleeves, plait breeches, plait socks, two baslaerd swords,[281] with blades a yard and half a quarter long, and two Scotch dirks at their girdles. Two gentlemen were to view the field, and see that the agreement as to arms and weapons was strictly observed; and the field being so viewed, the gentlemen were to ride to the rest of the company, leaving the combatants only two boys to hold their horses. The result is not known.[282]
May 11.
Sir Thomas Kennedy of Colzean was this day murdered in the immediate neighbourhood of the town of Ayr. ‘He was ane very potentous man, and very wise. He had buildit ane proper house in the Cove [the mansion superseded by the present Colzean Castle], with very brave yards; and, by ane moyen and other, had conquest ane guid living.’ We have seen, under January 1, 1596-7, an attempt upon the life of this gentleman at Maybole, by Mure of Auchindrain, who subsequently was reconciled to him, and, for the confirmation of amity, caused his son to be married to Sir Thomas’s daughter. It nevertheless became in time apparent that Mure was the prime mover of this atrocious murder, the circumstances of which are thus related by the king’s advocate, Sir Thomas Hamilton.
1602.
Sir Thomas Kennedy, ‘being only intentive on his own adoes, whilk did require his resort to Edinburgh, there to consult with his lawyers in his wechty business, he send his servant to Maybole, to seek Auchindrain and advertise him of his purpose; with direction, if he missed him there, that he sould certify him by letter of his intended journey; to the effect Auchindrain might, upon the next day, meet him upon the way at [the Duppil, a place near Ayr], and inform him of anything he wald wish him to do for him in Edinburgh, seeing it was but ane travel for him to do his friend’s business and his own. This servant of Colzean’s, missing Auchindrain in Maybole, desired Mr Robert Mure, schoolmaster at Maybole, to write ane letter of that substance to Auchindrain; who did so, and sent it by ane boy of his school, called William Dalrymple; who, finding Auchindrain at his house of Auchindrain, with his cousin Walter Mure of Cloncaird, ane deadly enemy to the Earl of Cassillis; so soon as he [Auchindrain] fand himself certified of Colzean’s purpose and diet, he dismissed the boy, commanding him to return back in haste, carrying the letter with him; directing him further to shaw to his master and Colzean’s man that he had not fand him at his house.... Immediately thereafter, [he] resolved with his cousin Cloncaird, that this occasion of revenge of Bargeny’s slaughter by Colzean’s murder was not to be unslipped.... After some deliberation, [he] concluded upon the choice of the actors and manner of the execution, making advertisement thereof, as weel by letter to Thomas Kennedy of Drumurchy ... as by message to Cloncaird.... The said Thomas Kennedy, Walter Mure of Cloncaird, and four or five servants with them, weel armed and horsed, convoying themselves near the way appointed by Colzean’s letter for his meeting with Auchindrain, did lie await for Colzean’s by-coming; who, being in full security of his dangerless estate, riding upon ane pacing nag, and having with him ane servant only, they suddenly surprised him, and with their pistols and swords gave him ane number of deadly wounds; and, not content to have so barbarously and traitorously bereft him of his life, spoiled him of ane thousand merks of gold, being in his purse, ane number of gold buttons upon his coat, and some rings and other jewels.’
‘He being slain, his man Lancelot brings him with him to the Greenan, and there gets ane horse litter, and takes him to Maybole, where there was great dule made for him.’—Hist. Ken.
Sir Thomas Hamilton proceeds to narrate that, while the actual murderers were first outlawed and afterwards forefaulted, Auchindrain fell under strong suspicion of having been the deviser of the deed. He, ‘being summoned to underlie the law, did boldly compear, and, seeing that the pursuers, for want of sufficient evidence, were not then to adventure his trial, fearing that he might be cleansed and so perpetually freed of that crime ... he seemed grieved thereat, as bragging exceedingly of his innocency, whereof he had given proof, by offering himself to trial of law—[he now proposed] if there were any man of Colzean’s kindred or friendship, who wald advow him any ways participant of the device or execution of that murder, he wald readily offer himself in that quarrel to the trial of combat to the death.... So, wanting ane party, [he] was dismissed, more free in the persuasion of most part of such as were present, than in his own conscience.’
1602.
The reader must be referred onward to July 1611 for the remainder of the history of this extraordinary criminal. Here, however, may be introduced the remarkable fact, that the Earl of Cassillis made an attempt to obtain a private revenge on Auchindrain for the murder of his uncle Colzean. The earl had long been on bad terms with his brother Hugh, whom we have seen as the guilty associate of Auchindrain. Now, he made up all past quarrels with Hugh, and granted him a bond, September 4, 1602, stating: ‘Howsoon our brother, Hugh Kennedy of Brownston, with his complices, takes the Laird of Auchindrain’s life, we sall mak guid and thankful payment to him and them of the sum of twelve hundred merks yearly, together with corn to six horses, [until] we receive them in household with ourself, beginning the first payment immediately after their committing of the said deed. Attour [moreover], howsoon we receive them in household, we shall pay to the twa serving gentlemen the fees, yearly, as our awn household servants. And hereto we oblige us, upon our honour.’[283]
Oct. 8.
1602.
A proclamation issued by the king at Dumfries, gives some idea of the social state of the middle marches, and of the arrangements required for the execution of justice amongst the rude and turbulent people of that district, while as yet the government had no standing force at its command. ‘Forsamickle,’ it proceeds, ‘as the king’s Majesty has causit proclaim and appoint justice-courts to be halden within the burghs of Peblis and Jedburgh upon the fifteen and twenty-sex day of October instant, for punishing and trying be order of justice the monyfauld enormities and insolencies whilk has been sae frequent and common thir years bygane within the middle marches, Like as his Majesty, accompaniet with a nowmer of his council, intends to be present at the said courts, and to hald hand to the due execution of justice, Wherefore necessity it is that his Majesty be weel and substantially accompaniet with a force of his guid subjects, Therefore ordains letters to be direct, charging all and sundry his Majesty’s lieges and subjects betwixt saxty and saxteen years, and others fencible persons, as well dwelling to burgh as to land, regality and royalty, within the bounds of the sheriffdoms of Peblis, Selkirk, and Roxburgh, that they ilk ane of them weel bodin in feir of weir in their substantious and weirlike manner address themselves to meet his Majesty at the days and places following; That is to say, the saids inhabitants within the sheriffdoms of Selkirk and Peblis to meet his Majesty at Peblis the said fifteen day of October instant, and the saids inhabitants within the sheriffdom of Roxburgh to meet his Majesty at Jedburgh upon the twenty-five day of the same month, provided to remain and attend upon his Majesty the space of fifteen days after their coming to the said burghs under the pain of tinsel of life, lands, and guids.’—P. C. R.
From some expressions in this proclamation, it seems likely to have been written by the king himself.
He did make a progress by Peebles and Jedburgh, and executed justice upon a number of luckless Elliots and Armstrongs.
A quarrel at this time took place between two chiefs of the North Highlands, Kenneth Mackenzie of Kintail and Macdonald of Glengarry. It were not easy to arrive at a just understanding of the case, or of the degrees of blame to which the several parties were liable; but it is not necessary. Enough that there was blood between these fierce paladins of the north, and that, however the right stood, the affair boded ill for Glengarry, seeing that he had to contend with an enemy crafty and able far beyond his class, and one who, by these means, was generally able to keep on good terms with the heads of administration in Edinburgh.
1602.
According to an unprinted memoir of the Clan Mackenzie—Glengarry and his son Angus, who had recently attained perfect age, took advantage of the temporary absence of Kintail in France to make a charge against the latter before the Privy Council; and Mackenzie was summoned at the pier of Leith to ‘compear’ before a certain day, under pain of forfeiture. This ‘moved Mr John Mackenzie of Tollie, parson of Dingwall, to travel to France, and bring his chief against the day of compearance. He came to Edinburgh only the night before, and having advised with his friends, he kept the diet unexpectedly before the Council. In the meantime, Alister M‘Gorrie and Ronald M‘Rorie [Glengarry men] made another onset to the Brae of Kissearn, and killed a gentleman of the family of Davachmaluach, called Donald M’Kinnich Vich Allister, sleeping in his bed; whose bloody shirt Mr John Mackenzie presented that day at Edinburgh. Glengarry could prove nothing against Mackenzie done in his time; but Mr John proved Glengarry to have been the instruments of this murder. Likewise he proved him to be a worshipper of the Coan, which image was afterwards brought to Edinburgh, and burnt at the Cross. Also he gave in against him that he was an extortioner and oppressor, sorning on his own commons and the commons of others, and that he still lived in adultery. Which moved Glengarry to steal from the place of justice, and to take to the hills, whereupon he was proclaimed rebel, and Mackenzie got the laws against him.’
Glengarry’s son having invaded Kintail, and done some mischief there, Mackenzie raised a force of seven hundred men, and retaliated by spoiling the district of Morar. Then the Macdonalds came in thirty-seven boats to Loch Broom, and counter-retaliated. Here Alister M‘Gorrie, one of their party, was killed, and his party beat back to sea. Indeed, the whole expedition failed. Soon after, however, while Mackenzie was absent in Mull, the Macdonalds came once more to his country, at Loch Carron, and committed great devastations. Their leader, Glengarry’s son, not only carried off all the cows he could find, but slew all the people that fell in his way, even the women and children. He was overtaken, however, by a fearful retribution.
1602.
‘Advertisement was sent to Kintail and Lochalsh, who gathered as fast as they could; but he [Glengarry’s son, Angus] had his boats laden before they came. After they gave him a flight of arrows, he took the sea, and they wanting boats, could not follow; but part of them went afoot to the Kyle; others made straight to Ellandonan, where they got a ten-oared boat and a four-oared boat. Mackenzie’s lady carried to them arrows and ammunition with her own hand. They rowed to the Kyle boldly, having no chieftain, but ilk ane striving who would act more for his mistress’s credit, and for the country’s defence. They came to the Kyle the Kintail men had the killing of them like selchies [seals]. At last they killed Glengarry’s son and all those that were in that great boat with him. The rest, when they heard the alarm, retired to Strathardle, and left their boats; from whence they went afoot, and took boats from the Isles to Morer. When they knew their chieftain was dead, with the best of his company, they gathered all together to ane isle, where the Lord Kintail came timeously the next morning in the sight of the Isles....
‘When Mackenzie came to the Kyle, he spied a number of dead corpses which the rage of the sea had casten ashore, which made him to think, seeing his enemy together a little while before, that it was his own men that were killed there. He had in his company two of Glengarry’s natives, who had quat Glengarry and submitted to him, and who were acquaint with both the country people [both clans or sets of people in the district] ... whom he desired to go ashore and see who they were that were dead. No sooner were they ashore but he espied them strike their hands upon their breasts, making great lamentation. “Praised be God!” said Kintail, “it is not for my countrymen you make such great lamentation. I am confident that God hath been favourable to my countrymen in giving them a pleasant victory.” When Robert [one of the Glengarry men] returned to the boat, Kintail asked: “What news?” “My lord,” saith he, “good news for your lordship; there is many a brave fellow of your enemies dead in yonder place; not so much as one of your countrymen amongst them.” Immediately they sailed away to Ellandonan, where Kintail’s men were no sooner landed but he met his countrymen returning from the burial of young Glengarry, whom they buried in the very door of the Kirk of Kintail, as testimony that they might trample over his body whenever they went to church.’[284]
Next year, Glengarry and some of his friends were indicted for slaughter in the Mackenzie country; and not long after, his lands of Lochalsh and castle of Strome had passed to the possession of the chief of Kintail.
1602.
In a Catalogue of the Scots Nobility and Officers of the Estate, by John Colville, written between 1600 and 1603, several of the Highland or rather Hebridean chiefs are described, as ‘The Lord of the Isles, callit Makrenald; ane Irish [Celtic] and barbar—The Lord of Kintyre, callit Makoneill; Irish and barbar—The Lord of the Lewis, callit Makgloyid; Irish and barbar—The Lord of Makklen, callit Makklen; Irish, a child of good expectation.’
The chief personage of the preceding notice is thus introduced: ‘The Lord of Makkenzie, callit Makkenzie; Irish; a protestant and verey politique.’
Nov. 1.
At Perth—‘Henry Balnaves and William Jack made their repentance in their awn seats on Sabbath afternoon, for making libel against Mr William Couper, minister, and Henry Elder, clerk—
As King David was ane sair sanct to the crown,
So is Mr William Couper and the clerk to this poor town.
Ane act of council against them, that nane of them should bear office or get honourable place in the town thereafter.’—Chron. Perth.
Dec. 1.
It had become a practice for persons who had revengeful feelings towards their neighbours to obtain petards from the continent, and employ them for the destruction of those against whom they had an ill-will. The king now issued a proclamation against ‘sic detestable and unworthy crimes, without example in any other kingdom,’ whereby ‘na man of whatsomever rank and calling can assure his awn safety and preservation within his awn house and iron yetts.’ He ordered all who have any ‘pittartis’ to surrender them at the next burgh immediately, and forbade any more being brought home by sea, or made or mended within the country.—P. C. R.
It seems not unworthy of observation, that by his familiarity with this explosive practice in his own country, as well as by the recollection of his father’s fate at the Kirk of Field, James might be in some measure prepared to smell out the gunpowder treason, as he did a few years later.
1603. Jan. 3.
‘John Haitly of Mellerstanes [was] slain at the Salt Tron [in Edinburgh] by William Home, his guid-father.’—Bir.
We have no account of what led to this dreadful kind of homicide; but, five years after (April 28, 1608), we find that the king had exerted himself to reconcile the friends of the parties, and they were ordered by the Privy Council to come forward on a particular day, and chop hands on the subject.—P. C. R.
Jan. 30.
1603.
‘Francis Mowbray brak ward out of the [Edinburgh] Castle, and he fell owir the wall, and brak his craig [neck]. Thereafter, he was trailit to the gallows, and hangit; and thereafter he was quarterit, and his head and four quarters put on the four ports.’
In this brief manner Birrel narrates the sad end of a sprightly and gallant, though intemperate spirit. Francis Mowbray was a son of Sir John Mowbray of Barnbougle, an ancient house long since gone down to nothing. Francis himself was the friend and companion of the Earl of Buccleuch, the hero of the attack on Carlisle Castle in 1596. He had taken part in that exploit, but soon after got into trouble, in consequence of a quarrel with one William Schaw, whom he struck through with a rapier, and killed. Worse than this, he was a Catholic, and engaged himself actively in some of those underhand political practices which at length came to a head in the Gunpowder Treason. He spent some time in a most suspicious place—the Infant’s Court at Brussels.
An Italian fencer named Daniel, residing in London, denounced Mowbray to Elizabeth’s government as having undertaken to kill the king of Scots. Mowbray denied the accusation, and offered the combat. The two being sent down to Edinburgh, it was arranged that they should fight hand to hand in the great close of Holyroodhouse; but before the appointed day arrived, notice came from England that some witnesses had come forward who could prove the treason. On the 29th of January, Mowbray was confronted with the two witnesses, who, however, were considered as ‘of light account,’ being men of bankrupt fortunes, who had from that cause left their country. Mowbray still stood stoutly to his denial, uttering this adjuration before the king: ‘If ever I thought evil, or intended evil against my prince, God, that marketh the secrets of all hearts, make me fall at my enemies’ feet—make me a spectacle to all Edinburgh, and cast my soul in hell for ever!’ The two were placed in several apartments in Edinburgh Castle, the Italian occupying a room immediately above Mowbray.
1603.
At eight o’clock in the evening of the 30th of January, being Sunday, Francis Mowbray was found dying at the foot of the Castle rock. It was stated that he had sewed his blankets together, and let himself down over the wall; but the line being too short, he fell, and mortally injured himself. The unfortunate man died in the course of the night. An attempt was made by some friends to raise a report that he had been thrown over the window; but this was believed by few, and really is not very credible. The authorities shewed no hesitation about the matter; but, concluding on the guilt of the deceased, had his body dragged backwards through the streets to the bar of the Court of Justiciary, where sentence was duly passed against him. The corpse was then dealt with as Birrel relates. The superstitious remarked the verification of the fearful words of the deceased—that he might fall at his enemies’ feet, and become a spectacle to all Edinburgh.—Pit. Cal. Spot. Notes to Russell’s edition of Spottiswoode, 1851.
This year was published in Edinburgh a comedy, entitled Philotus, which we must consider as a curiosity in its way, since it is the first known effort of the Scottish muse in that department of literature.[285] It is founded on a story which we find under the name of Philotus and Emilia in a volume by Barnaby Riche, originally published in 1581,[286] being, in plain terms, a somewhat licentious Italian novel. The Scotch comedy is in rhymed verse, and entirely in the characteristic Scotch manner of that age; but not a shadow of plausible conjecture has yet been indulged in regarding the possible author.[287]
The main series of incidents involves the fate of a young woman, Emilia, who is solicited to become the second wife of Philotus, an old and rich man. A Macrell, or go-between, is employed to bring her to his wishes, and addresses her in a long speech, which incidentally illustrates the life of a fine lady of that age:
1603.
‘Ye neither mell with lad nor loon,
But with the best in all this toun;
His wife may ay sit foremost doun,
At either buird or bink,
Gang foremost in at door or yett,
And ay the first guid-day wald get,
With all men honourit and weel-tret,
As ony heart wald think.
See what a woman’s mind may meese,[288]
And hear what honour, wealth, and ease,
Ye may get with him, an ye please
To do as I devise:
Your fire sall first be burning clear,
Your maidens then sall have your geir[289]
Put in guid order and effeir,[290]
Ilk morning or[291] you rise.
And say: ‘Lo, mistress, here your muils;[292]
Put on your wyliecoat or it cuils;
Lo, here ane of your velvet stuils,
Whereon ye sall sit doun:
Then twasome come to kame your hair,
Put on your head-geir soft and fair;
Tak there your glass—see all be clair;
And sae gaes on your goun.
Then tak, to stanch your morning drouth,
Ane cup of Malvoisie, for your mouth;
For fume cast succar in a fouth,[293]
Together with a toast.
Three garden gowps[294] tak of the air,
And bid your page in haste prepare,
For your disjune, some dainty fair,
And care not for nae cost.
Ane pair of plovers piping het,
Ane partrick and ane quailie get,
Ane cup of sack, sweet and weel set,
May for ane breakfast gain.[295]
Your cater he may care for syne
Some delicate, again’ you dine;
Your cook to season all sae fine,
Then does employ his pain.
To see your servants may you gang,
And look your maidens all amang,
And, gif there ony wark be wrang,
Then bitterly them blame:
Then may ye have baith quoifs and kells,[296]
Hich candie ruffs, and barlet bells,
All for your wearing and nought els,
Made in your house at hame.
And now when all thir warks are done,
For your refreshing after noon,
Gar bring into your chamber soon,
Some dainty dish of meat;
Ane cup or twa with Muscadel,
Some other licht thing therewithal—
For raisins or for capers call,
Gif that ye please to eat.
Till supper time then may ye chuse,
Into your garden to repose,
Or merrily to tak ane gloze,[297]
Or tak ane book and read on;
Syne to your supper are ye brought,
Till fare, full far that has been sought,
And dainty dishes dearly bought,
That ladies love to feed on.
The organs then, into your hall,
With shalm and timbrel sound they sall,
The viol and the lute withal,
To gar your meat digest:
The supper done, then up ye rise,
To gang ane while, as is the guise[298]—
By ye have roamit ane alley thrice,
It is a mile almaist.
Then ye may to your chalmer gang,
Beguile the nicht, gif it be lang,
With talk, and merry mows[299] amang,
To elevate the spleen.
For your collation tak ane taste,
Some little licht thing till digest,
At nicht use Rhen’sh wine ay almaist
For it is cauld and clean.
And for your back I dare be bold,
That ye sall wear even as ye wold,
With double garnishings of gold,
And crape above your hair.
Your velvet hat, your hood of state,
Your missle[300] when ye gang the gait,
Frae sun and wind, baith air and late,
To keep that face sae fair.
Of Paris wark, wrought by the lave,[301]
Your fine half-cheinyies ye sall have;
For to decore, ane carkat[302] crave,
That comely collar-bane.
Your great gold cheinyie for your neck,
Be bowsome to the carle, and beck,
For he has gold eneuch, what-reck?
It will stand on nane.
1603.
And for your gouns, ay the new guise
Ye with your tailors may devise,
To have them loose with plaits and plies,
Or claspit close behind:
The stuff, my heart, ye need not hain,
Pan velvet raised, figurit or plain,
Silk, satin, damask, or grograin,
The finest ye can find.
Your claiths on colours cuttit out,
And all pasmented[303] round about,
My blessing on that seemly snout,
Sae weel, I trow, sall set them!
Your shanks[304] of silk, your velvet shoon,
Your broidered wyliecoat aboon,
As ye devise, all sall be done,
Uncraipit, when ye get them.
Your tablet, by your halse[305] that hings,
Gold bracelets, and all other things,
And all your fingers full of rings,
With pearls and precious stanes,
Ye sall have ay while ye cry ho,
Rickles[306] of gold and jewels too,
What reck to tak the bogle-go,
My bonny bird, for anes.’
Feb. 9.
This is the date of an outbreak of private warfare which throws all contemporary events of the same kind into the shade.
1603.
In pursuance of a quarrel of some standing between the Clan Gregor and Colquhoun, Laird of Luss, the former came in force to the banks of Loch Lomond. The parties met in Glenfruin, and the Colquhouns, out-manœuvred by the enemy, were overthrown. The Macgregors, besides killing a number of persons, variously stated at three score and four score, in the battle, are alleged to have murdered a number of prisoners (amongst whom, by the way, was Tobias Smollett, bailie of Dumbarton, very likely an ancestor of the novelist, his namesake), and also some poor unarmed people. The whole slaughter is set down at 140 persons. Besides all this, they carried off 600 cattle, 800 sheep and goats, fourteen score of horse and mares, ‘with the haill plenishing, gudes and geir, of the four-score-pound land of Luss, burning and destroying everything else.’ It has been alleged that they killed the laird after taking him prisoner, and murdered a number of school-boys from the college or school of Dumbarton; but these would appear to be groundless charges. Such as their guilt was, it proved the commencement of a long course of oppression and misery endured by this clan. According to a contemporary writer, a mournful procession came to Edinburgh, bearing eleven score of bloody shirts, to excite the indignation of the king against the Macgregors. There being no friend of the Macgregors present to plead their cause, letters of intercommuning were immediately issued against them.
The feeling of a state-officer of these days regarding the unruly population of the north, comes strongly out in a letter of the President Lord Fyvie, written to the king a few weeks after he had gone to London. ‘Your majesty will understand by your Council’s letters the estate and proceedings with the Macgregors. Gif all the great Highland clans war at the like point, I wald think it ane great ease and weel to this commonwealth, and to your majesty’s guid subjects here.‘[307]
It was arranged soon after that a large number of the Clan Gregor should be deported from the country, but whither does not appear. The Privy Council requested the king to allow a ship to be sent for them, ‘seeing all these wha are to depart, in whilk number the laird himself is ane, are ... unable of themselves aither to defray their charges, furnish themselves of victuals, or pay their fraught.’
Witch seated on the Moon.—From a Sculpture in Elgin Cathedral.