“Poor man!” was the reply, “I forgive thee and all men.”
They died, at peace with God and man. An old tombstone, surrounded by an iron rail, marks to this day the spot among the old oak-trees where the bodies of McCubine and Gordon were laid to rest.
Commenting on this to his friend Selby, the Reverend George Lawless gave it as his opinion that “two more fanatics were well out of the world.”
To which the Reverend Frank replied very quietly:
“Yes, George, well out of it indeed; and, as I would rather die with the fanatics than live with the godless, I intend to join the Covenanters to-night—so my pulpit shall be vacant to-morrow.”
Chapter Eleven.
Coming Events Cast Shadows.
In February 1685 Charles the Second died—not without some suspicion of foul play. His brother, the Duke of York, an avowed Papist, ascended the throne as James the Second. This was a flagrant breach of the Constitution, and Argyll—attempting to avert the catastrophe by an invasion of Scotland at the same time that Monmouth should invade England—not only failed, but was captured and afterwards executed by the same instrument—the “Maiden”—with which his father’s head had been cut off nigh a quarter of a century before. As might have been expected, the persecutions were not relaxed by the new king.