At the same time, a like concession was made in favour of ‘Robert Allan, chamberlain to the Earl of Marr,’ for the benefit of the men working in his lordship’s coal-mines; the same privilege was conferred on the Duke of Queensberry, for the workmen at his lead-mines, and ‘workmen builders at his Grace’s house [Drumlanrig];’ on the Earl of Annandale, for his servants and workmen; and on Alexander Inglis, factor for the colliers on the estate of Clackmannan. All these noblemen were members of the Privy Council.
Not long after (May 4, 1699), Roderick Mackenzie of Prestonhall was desirous of bringing a quantity of victual from his lands in Forfarshire, to be used at his residence in Mid-Lothian; but it was prevented by the magistrates of Dundee from being shipped there, upon pretence of a late act of Privy Council, allowing certain persons to prohibit the transporting of victual from the northern to the southern districts, if they should see fit. It was evident, argued Mackenzie, that this act was only designed to prevent a traffic in corn for profit at the expense of the lieges: his case was wholly different, as clearly appeared from the smallness of the quantity in question—namely, forty bolls of meal, twenty of malt, and thirty of oats.
On his petition, the Council allowed him to transport the victual, and enjoined that in doing so ‘he should not be troubled or robbed within the said town of Dundee, or liberties thereof, as they will be answerable.’[[243]]
Dec. 27.
Foreigners were accustomed to come to Scotland with ships, and carry away multitudes of people to their own plantations, there to serve as labourers. There was now issued a strict proclamation against this practice, offenders to be held and treated as man-stealers.[[244]]
Nevertheless, in November 1704, Captain William Hutcheson, of the province of Maryland, petitioned the Privy Council for liberty to transport to his country six young pickpockets and twenty-two degraded women, then in the correction-house of Edinburgh, who had all ‘of their own choice and consent’ agreed to go along with him; and the request was agreed to, under no |1698.| other restriction than that he was not to carry away any other persons, and should ‘aliment’ those whom he was to take away until they should leave the country.
Nearly about the same time, John Russell, merchant in Edinburgh, was allowed to carry off twenty persons, chiefly women, from the jails of the city, to the plantations.
Such were the facts in view when pamphleteers afterwards twitted the rebellious colonists with the taunt that the Adam and Eve of Maryland and Virginia came out of Newgate.
1699. Jan.
When the Bank of Scotland was started in 1695, there were no notes for sums below five pounds. For the extension of the bank’s paper, there were now issued notes for twenty shillings—ever since a most notable part of the circulating medium in Scotland. These small notes readily got into use in Edinburgh and some parts of the provinces; yet the hopes which some entertained of their obtaining a currency in public markets and fairs were not at first realised—for, as one remarks thirty years later, ‘nothing answers there among the common people but silver money,[[245]] even gold being little known amongst them.’[[246]]