[426] Acta Parl. Scot., v. 238.
[427] Rec. Conv. Roy. Burghs, iv. 534, 535.
[428] “Whereat we ourselff for the most part were present,”—king to Council, 15th July 1632. Stirling Letters, ii. 604.
[429] State Papers, Dom., ccvi. 46.
[430] State Papers, Dom., ccvi. 50.
[431] State Papers, Dom., cciii. 53, 54, 19th November 1631. The draft appears to have been prepared and altered entirely by the king himself.
[432] State Papers, Dom., ccxxix. 78, 83, 87, 89.
[433] The king to the Council, 15th July 1632. Stirling Letters, ii. 605, 606, 617. Acta Parl. Scot., v. 245.
[434] The Act specified by the king was passed in 1491, but he seems rather to have been referring to the Act 6 James III., c. 48. “That Lordes, Barrones and Burrowes gar make Schippes, Busches, and greate Pinck-boates with Nettes,” which was passed in 1471, “for the common good of the realm and the great increase of riches,” to be brought from other countries in exchange for fish exported. The Act of James IV., “Anent the makeing of Schippes and Busches on the quhilk all Idle Men suld Laboure,” was an early attempt to carry out the policy advocated by English writers in the sixteenth, seventeenth, and eighteenth centuries. It enacted that ships and busses, not under twenty tons burden, should be built in all the burghs and towns of Scotland, provided with mariners and nets: and power was given to compel “idle men” to man them.
[435] State Papers, Dom., ccvi. 47. “What is required from the Lords and Gentry of Scotland towards the fishing.”