It was long before the hideous story of Glencoe came to be generally known. On the facts being published, there rose a popular clamour for an inquiry. On the eve of the meeting of the Scottish Parliament, in 1695, it was known to ministers that the war-cry would be “Glencoe.” So in haste they got the King to appoint a Commission. After a searching enquiry, the Commission reported that the slaughter at Glencoe was murder; and that of this murder the letters of the Master of Stair were the sole warrant and cause. As a punishment for his great crime, Stair was dismissed from office!
The Union of Scotland and England.
Just at the time when the full realization of the horrors of Glencoe was agitating the public mind, the disastrous Darien scheme was floated. This, the first great national adventure in foreign commerce, was a wild speculation, based upon the fanciful assumptions of one man, William Paterson. His scheme was to establish a trading colony on the narrow isthmus joining North and South America, as a convenient stage between India and Europe. His eloquent tongue, and even more eloquent reservations, produced glowing visions of national and individual wealth. There was a rush for shares in the “Company of Scotland;” for their purchase landowners mortgaged their estates, farmers sold their cattle, widows pledged their jointures. Nearly half-a-million sterling was subscribed. Ships and stores were purchased, and in July, 1698, a colonizing expedition of 1200 men left Leith, amidst the wildest popular enthusiasm. It reached its destination, and under the ninth parallel of north latitude a New Edinburgh was founded.
The enterprise was an utter failure; the climate was found to be a deadly one, and famine was imminent; many died, and there was general sickness and debility. Under instructions from the home government, the governors of English West India settlements issued proclamations, denouncing the Scottish colonists as pirates, and interdicting supplies and communications. The Spaniards, claiming the land as theirs, were fitting out hostile armaments. Finding that to remain meant nothing short of extermination, all who were left took to their ships; drifting almost at the mercy of winds and waves, they arrived at the Hudson river. A second expedition of 1300 men landed to find ruins and a solitude, and to meet a similar fate.
Glencoe had largely weakened the popularity of William in Scotland, and his hostile action towards the Darien scheme excited hatred and disloyalty. Jacobitism, instead of wearing itself out, became more deeply rooted and more formidable. The golden link of the crown, which during the seventeenth century had been the only official tie between the two nations, seemed a fragile one; and the King saw, with the prescience of a statesman, that there must either be closer union, or entire separation. He could see that—comparatively weak as Scotland was—its influence might, under a foreign complication, have to be deducted from the strength of England.
In February, 1702, William met with the accident—a fall from his horse—which resulted in his death. When he knew that his end was approaching he sent his last message under his sign-manual to Parliament, recommending the union of the kingdoms; it would be a comfort to him if Parliament would favourably consider the matter. The Commons agreed to consider the King’s message on the 7th of March—on that day he was in extremis—dying in the night.
Then Anne, William’s sister-in-law, reigned. The Scots were still irritable over the English treatment of the Darien scheme, and their Parliament passed what was called The Act of Security. By this act it was ordained that the English successor to the then reigning sovereign, would not be adopted by Scotland, unless there was free trade between the two countries, and the internal affairs of Scotland thoroughly secured from English influence. The Queen’s High Commissioner refused the royal assent to this defiant measure, and the English House of Peers passed a resolution, that a dangerous plot existed in Scotland for the overthrow of the Protestant succession in that nation. The Scots highly resented this resolution, declaring it to be an unauthorised interference with the concerns of an independent kingdom. The Estates refused to grant supplies, and ordered the disciplining, by monthly drills, of all men capable of bearing arms. The reply of the English Parliament was, by the enactment of fresh restrictions upon Scottish trade with England and its colonies, and by ordering the border towns of Newcastle, Berwick, and Carlisle to be fortified and garrisoned.
But the queen had in her minister, Earl Godolphin, a wise and sagacious statesman; by his advice she gave in 1704, her assent to the Act of Security. And the English Parliament empowered the queen to nominate commissioners to discuss with commissioners appointed by the Scottish estates terms of a treaty of union between the two nations. Thirty commissioners were thus appointed on each side; ostensibly they represented all parties; but Godolphin’s powerful influence was so exerted in the selection, that not only was there a majority on both sides in favour of union, but also for that union being favourable to England. There is more than mere suspicion that English money was freely given, and English promises of personal advancement were largely made, to induce the Scottish Commissioners to agree to terms which were certainly unjust to Scotland.
The numerical proportion of its population, entitled Scotland to send sixty-six members to a united House of Commons; but the number was restricted to forty-five. Of the Scottish nobility, not one was to be entitled by right of title or of possessions, to sit in the House of Lords; but there were to be sixteen representative peers. For the English bishops holding seats in the upper house, there was to be no Scottish counterpart. The Scottish nobles on the Commission were tempted to agree to the ignominious position their order was to be placed in by the promise that themselves would be created British peers, with hereditary seats in the Lords. Scotland was to pay a fair proportion of the general taxation. She was to retain her Presbyterian Church, and her own civil and municipal laws and institutions.