[108] In MS. G, "bairdit mulls;" in Vautr. edit, and MS. L 2, "barbed mules;" MS. I, has "barbed mooles;" MSS. A, W, and E, "bardit" or "barded mules"—the meaning of the phrase is, mules with trappings, or richly caparisoned.
[109] In MS. G, "conceat."
[110] The custom of choosing the King of the Bean on the Vigil of the Epiphany (5th of January), was not peculiar to this country. The payments in the Treasurer's Accounts show, that a "Queen of the Bene" was frequently chosen. For the custom itself, see Strutt's Sports and Pastimes; Brand's Popular Antiquities, by Sir Henry Ellis; and Jamieson's Dictionary, v. Bane. Sir Thomas Urquhart of Cromarty, amongst other remarks, says, the Presbyterians made use of Kings "as we do of card-kings, in playing at the hundred," &c., "or, as the French on the Epiphany-day use their Roy de la febre, or King of the Bean; whom, after they have, honoured with drinking of his health, and shouting aloud Le Roy boit, le Roy boit, they make pay for all the reckoning; not leaving him sometimes one peny, rather then that the exorbitancie of their debosh should not be satisfied to the full."—(Most Exquisite Jewell, Lond. 1652, p. 238.)
[111] In MS. L 2, after the words, "of many read," there is added, "for every gentleman at Court was curious to gett the coppie of the same, as was thocht weill of by the most part; but what," &c. On the other hand, the transcriber of that MS., in the next paragraph, omits two or three passages, concerning "the bloodie beasts," and "bands," in referring to the persecutions at this time, by "Beaton and his Doctors."
[112] In MS. G, "greitlie."
[113] The time of Forresse, or Forrest's imprisonment and martyrdom has not been well ascertained; and Knox's subsequent remark, "after whose death, the flame of persecution ceased, till the death of Norman Gourlay, the space of ten years or neirby," is not intelligible, according to the dates usually assigned. Foxe gives no precise date, but says, that within few years after Hamilton's martyrdom, "ane Henry Forrest, a young man born in Linlithgow, who a little before had received the orders of Benet and Collet, &c., suffered death at the North Church stile of the Abbey Church of St. Andrews," (edit. 1576, p. 955.)—Caldorwood has copied from Foxe, and supposes it might have been in 1529, or the year following. (Hist, vol. i. p. 97.) Keith conjectures it was about 1533. (Hist, vol. i. p. 15;) and MʻCrie, in 1530. (Life of Knox, vol. i. p. 354.)—As Knox speaks of Forresse's "long imprisonment," we may conjecture it was in 1532. From the Treasurer's Accounts, 17th of May 1532, we find that some persons were then under accusation of heresy, letters having been sent on that day "to the Bishop of St. Andrews, to advertize him of the changing of the dirt of the accusation of the Lutherans."—Forrest was a Benedictine Monk; and from mention of the town where he was born, we may conjecture he was the son of "Thomas Forrest of Linlithgow," to whom various sums were paid by the Treasurer "to the bigging of the dyke about the Paliss of Linlithgow," between April and July 1505.
[114] Vautr. edit, and all the later MSS. have erroneously "the said tower." The Castle of St. Andrews, originally built in the year 1200, by Bishop Roger, as an Episcopal residence, stands close to the sea-shore, and one of the towers projecting into the sea, no doubt obtained for it this name. "A nuik in the bottom of the Sea tower, a place where many of God's children had been imprisoned before," is again mentioned by Knox in 1547.
[115] [See note [113] above: all the MSS. read "ten years."
[116] The events here mentioned were all connected with the sway of the Douglasses in the minority of James the Fifth. The first was the attempt by Sir Walter Scott of Buccleuch, at the head of 1000 horse, at Melrose, to rescue the King from the Earl of Angus, on the 25th of January 1526. The second was an equally unsuccessful attempt, for the same end, by the Earl of Lennox, at Kirkliston, on the 4th of September that year, where Lennox was cruelly slain by Sir James Hamilton of Finnart. But the King at length made his escape from Falkland in July 1528, (or, as Mr. Tytler conjectures, on the 22d or 23d of May.) On the 5th of September that year, an act of forfeiture was passed against Archibald Earl of Angus, his uncle, and his brother Sir George Douglas. They had retired to England, and continued in exile till the death of James in 1542.
[117] Wyncester, that is Stephen Gardyner, Bishop of Winchester. He became Lord Chancellor of England in the reign of Mary, and died in November 1555. See Lord Campbell's Lives of the Chancellors, vol. ii. pp. 40-71.