At this point a married daughter of Mrs McLachlan, named Milliken, who could not believe that the sentence would really be carried out, gave way to violent lamentations, and fainted when she saw that her mother’s doom was fixed. They carried the poor creature away from the dreadful scene.
The old woman was first pushed over the brink of the river, and a soldier, thrusting her head down into the water with a halbert, held it there. This was evidently done to terrify the younger woman into submission, for, while the aged martyr was struggling in the agonies of death, one of the tormentors asked Margaret Wilson what she thought of that sight.
“What do I see?” was her reply. “I see Christ in one of His members wrestling there. Think ye that we are sufferers? No! it is Christ in us; for He sends none a warfare on his own charges.”
These were her last words as she was pushed over the bank, and, like her companion, forcibly held, down with a halbert. Before she was quite suffocated, however, Winram ordered her to be dragged out, and, when able to speak, she was asked if she would pray for the King.
“I wish the salvation of all men,” she replied, “and the damnation of none.”
“Dear Margaret,” urged a bystander in a voice of earnest entreaty, “say ‘God save the King,’ say ‘God save the King.’”
“God save him if He will,” she replied. “It is his salvation I desire.”
“She has said it! she has said it!” cried the pitying bystanders eagerly.
“That won’t do,” cried the Laird of Lagg, coming forward at the moment, uttering a coarse oath; “let her take the test-oaths.”
As this meant the repudiation of the Covenants and the submission of her conscience to the King—to her mind inexcusable sin—the martyr firmly refused to obey. She was immediately thrust back into the water, and in a few minutes more her heroic soul was with her God and Saviour.