Part 35

‘My lord, having ane decreet against ane servant, of the Laird of Bargeny’s, callit John M‘Alexander, of the lands of Dangart ... wald put the same in execution, and intromit with the haill corns that was upon the grund; and send his household servants, and gart [caused] intromit with some of the corns, and shore ane part thereof. This coming to the Laird of Bargeny’s ears, he loups on in Ardstinchar, and rides to the land, and with horse and carts brought the corns that they had shorn with him to Ardstinchar; for, he said: “My lord had nae richt to the corns, albeit he had obteenit decreet against the land.” This being on the Saturday, my lord provides with all his force he can, against Monday, to shear the rest of the corns. And the Laird of Bargeny, in the same manner, provides for the same effect. The Laird of Bargeny, [being] the nearest hand, comes first to the grund, and to the number of six hundred men on horse, with twa hundred hagbutters. And my Lord of Ochiltree came also, with the number of ane hunder horse; so that, in all, he was, or [ere] twelve hours, the number of nine hunder men, on foot and horse. My Lord of Cassillis come also, with his haill force that he might mak, to the like number or few mae [more]. But the Laird, being in the house and yards, and he having many basses and hagbuts of found with him, the same was onpossible for my lord to mend himself. But my Lord of Cathcart, being ane nobleman wha had married to his wife ane near kinswoman of my Lord Cassillis, and his son having married the Laird of Bargeny’s sister, travelled amang them, and took up the matter in this sort, that the laird should have the haill corns that was on the grund to his servant, and should find caution for the duty of the land, whilk was my lord’s; and that my lord should come to the grund of the lands, and, according to his decreet, tak possession of the same, but not to steir the corns; and the Laird of Carleton and the Gudeman of Ardmillan to be cautioners for the foresaid duty, and my lord fand caution not to trouble the corns, nor the man in the shearing of them. And [according] to this agreeance, the laird rade his way to Ardstinchar; and my lord came to the land and took possession; and John M’Alexander shore his corns in peace.’--_Hist. Ken._

[Sidenote: 1600.

JAN.]

There was a feid of old standing between the Lindsays of Forfarshire and the Lords Glammis; but for some years the parties were put under the restraint of _letters of assurance_. On a particular Sunday, during this month, Sir John Lindsay of Woodhead was passing along the High Street of Edinburgh, ‘gangand to the kirk,’ when he met Lord Glammis. The noble and gentle, ‘for the reverence they bure to his majesty and for observance of the assurance standing betwix them, past by other without provocation of offence or displeasure in word or countenance offerit by ony of them.’ As in the case of Montague and Capulet, however, the servants were not always to be restrained by the same feelings as the masters. After they were past, Patrick Johnston, a servant or tenant of Glammis, ‘drew his sword, invadit and pursewit the complenar [Lindsay] of his life, and strak and cuttit through the shoulder of his cloak, coat, and doublet, without the allowance of Lord Glammis, and thereby did what in him lay to have begun ane new feid and quarrel betwixt them, whilk wald not have faillit to have fallen out were not Lord Glammis himself and the complenar stayit it.’

[Sidenote: JAN. 13.]

Two days after, Lord Glammis appeared personally before the Privy Council, and ‘renouncit Patrick to be his man, tenant, or servant, sae that he sall not be repute, halden, nor esteemit to be his man, tenant, or servant hereafter;’ further avouching that ‘he sall quarrel nor beir grudge to nane that sall invade or pursue the said Patrick.’ The Council at the same time charged Patrick to compeir and answer for ‘his late violent and unhonest pursuit and invasion of Sir John Lindsay, _without the consent, knowledge, or allowance of Patrick Lord Glammis_, in whais company he was for the time, doing thereby what in him lay to have brocht on and protinued furder trouble and inconvenients betwixt the said Lord Glammis and the friends of the house of Crawford, to the break of his majesty’s peace and disquieting of the country.’--_P. C. R._

An order to denounce Patrick as rebel for not appearing, was given on the 6th of March.

[Sidenote: 1600.]

We receive in this notice a rich illustration of the relation of superior and ‘man’ in Scotland at the close of the sixteenth century. Johnston’s crime of assault is here touched upon lightly; what is pressed, is his committing this assault without the consent of his lord, and endangering a further quarrel between that lord and the assaulted man.

The affair appears to have had a sequel not less remarkable than itself. On Sunday the 6th of August 1601, as Patrick Johnston, designated as tenant of the Halltown of Belhelvies, was leaving the kirk of that parish, in time of the ministration of the sacrament of baptism, accompanied by his wife and two of his children, he was set upon, within two paces of the door, by Lord Glammis and a party of his lordship’s relatives and servants, and mercilessly slain with pistols and swords. We can scarcely doubt that this was the same Patrick who had incurred his superior’s anger by attacking Sir John Lindsay. A complaint against Lord Glammis and his ‘complices’ for the act was made before the presbytery of Aberdeen, by ‘the wife and aucht fatherless bairns’ of the slain man, and by that reverend court an effort was made, but in vain, to bring the matter to an arrangement in their favour. The guilty parties were cited for their crime before the Court of Justiciary in March 1602; but no punishment appears to have followed. Lord Glammis obtained a remission for his concern in Johnston’s slaughter, under the great seal. The ancient feudal ideas of Scotland were still too strong to allow of such a case being deemed one of common murder.[243] The fact did not prevent Lord Glammis from receiving advancement in court-favour and elevation in rank. He was made Earl of Kinghorn in 1606. It is also somewhat curious to reflect that to his taste and munificence we owe much of what is grand in the architecture of Glammis Castle.

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[Sidenote: FEB.]

At this time arrived in Edinburgh the young Earl of Gowrie, and his brother, Alexander Ruthven, from Padua, where they had been studying for some years. To all appearance, they were disposed to be peaceable subjects of the king, notwithstanding the hard measure which had been dealt out to their father sixteen years before. When, some months afterwards, they came to so tragical an end, a circumstance, which occurred not long after their arrival in Edinburgh, was remembered, as betraying a state of mind different from what appeared on the surface of their general behaviour.

[Sidenote: 1600.]

A certain Colonel Stuart of Houston, who, as commander of the royal guard, had been employed in seizing the late unfortunate Earl of Gowrie, was still employed at court. One day in June, as the young earl, accompanied with seven or eight of his servants, was passing along the long gallery of the palace, on his way to the king’s chamber, he observed Colonel Stuart come forth from an interview with his royal master. To avoid a too close meeting with one so painfully associated with his family history, he stepped aside a little, in order to let Stuart pass by. ‘The same being espied by ane of the said earl’s servants, going in the rank before him, callit Mr Thomas Kinrosser, [he] said ardently till him: “What, my lord, are you going back for ony man here? Come forward, my lord, bauldly!” Whilk going aside and then coming forward again, being seen by Colonel Stuart, he went in again to the king.

“Sir, it will please your majesty hear ane strange matter, that, for guid service done to your grace, I sould be so evil rewardit as I am. Here comes in the Earl of Gowrie, and I see he minds to begin first at me; but beware next of the best of you all.”

Herewith the said earl enterit in his majesty’s chalmer, and the colonel went out thereof; but there was nothing of that purpose spoken betwixt his majesty and the earl at that time. But, the colonel’s words to the king being reported to the earl, he answered: “_Aquila non captat muscas_.”‘--_Jo. Hist._

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[Sidenote: MAR. 14.]

The king, returning from a General Assembly in Edinburgh to his palace of Falkland, crossed the Firth of Forth by the ferry between Leith and Kirkcaldy. The weather was fair at starting, but became foul on the passage, and the mariners were obliged to run their boat upon the sands at Kirkcaldy, where the king was taken out on horseback. ‘He exclaimed with execration, that he was ever in danger of his life in going to those assemblies.’--_Cal._

* * * * *

[Sidenote: APR. 2.]

[Sidenote: 1600.]

‘... being the Sabbath-day, Robert Auchmuty, barber, slew James Wauchope at the combat in St Leonard’s Hill, and upon the 23d, the said Robert [was] put in ward in the Tolbooth of Edinburgh. In the meantime of his being in ward, he hang ane cloak without the window of the iron house, and another within the window there, and, saying that he was sick, and might not see the light, he had aquafortis continually seething at the iron window, while [till] at the last the iron window was eaten through. Sae, upon a morning, he causit his prentice-boy attend when the town-guard should have dissolvit, at whilk time the boy waited on, and gave his master ane token that the said guard were gone, by the show or wave of his handcurch. The said Robert hung out ane tow whereon he thought to have come down. The said guard spied the wave of the handcurch, and sae the said Robert was disappointit of his intention and device; and sae, on the 10 day, he was beheadit at the Cross, upon ane scaffold.’--_Bir._

* * * * *

[Sidenote: MAY.]

We possess the rental-sheet of the Marquis of Huntly for this date, and obtain from it a striking idea of the worldly means resting with that noble and potent lord. In the first place, the document extends over fifty-nine pages of print in small quarto, detailing the particulars of money and produce due from each farm on his lordship’s various estates--in the lordship of Huntly, the lordship of the Enzie, the lordship of Badenoch, the barony of Fochabers, the lands of Marr, the Cabrach, and Lochaber. The sum of ‘silver mail’ or money-rent is £3819, besides £636 of teind silver. The ‘ferm victual’ payable to his lordship was 3816 bolls, besides which there were 55 bolls of custom meal, 436 of multure beir, 108 of custom oats, 83 of custom victual, 167 marts (cattle for slaughter), 483 sheep, 316 lambs, 167 grice (young pigs), 14 swine, 1389 capons, 272 geese, 3231 poultry, 700 chickens, 5284 eggs, 4 stones of candle, 46 stones of brew tallow, 34 leats of peats, 990 ells of custom linen, 94 stones of custom butter, 40 barrels of salmon, 8 bolls of teind victual, 2 stones of cheese, and 30 kids. The large proportion of payment in kind speaks of a country in which there was little industry or commerce beyond what was connected with husbandry and store-farming; but it is easy to see what an amount of power the noble marquis would derive from possessing the means of feeding so many retainers.

[Sidenote: 1600.]

In old times, so wealthy a lord was a kind of kinglet, owning, indeed, the superiority of a sovereign, but at the same time enjoying among minor lords and gentlemen a sway which barely owned a restraint in the royal authority. Men approaching him in influence were glad to form alliances with him, either through the ties of marriage, or by direct _bonds of manred_, in which they mutually agreed to support each other in all causes, against all living or dead, excepting only the king’s grace. Of such bonds, the Gordon charter-chest exhibits a grand series, extending from 1444, when James of Forbes ‘becomes man till ane honourable and mighty lord, Alexander of Seton of Gordon ... again all deadly,’ down to 1670, when Alexander Rose of Tillisnaucht, gave George, Marquis of Huntly, an engagement to live peaceably under his protection; being a hundred and seven in all. Even within the last seventeen years, during which the now existing marquis had been conducting his own affairs, the house had been receiving bonds of manred from a remarkable number of important men in the Highlands. The Earl of Argyle, in 1583, promised to ‘concur and take aefald, true, and plain part’ with the Gordon, ‘in all his honest and guid causes against whatsomever that live or die may, our sovereign lord and his authority alone excepted.’ Two years later, Macleod of Lewis receives promise of maintenance on the condition of obedience. At the same time, the chief of the Clan Kenzie, Colin of Kintail, enters into a bond of faithful service, ‘contrair all persons.’ His lordship received the like engagements from Monro of Foulis, the chieftain Glengarry, Macgregor of Glenstrae, and Drummond of Blair. In 1586, Kenneth Mackenzie of Kintail, Donald Robertson, the heir of Strowan, Donald Gorm of Sleat (progenitor of the present Lord Macdonald), John Grant of Freuchie, and the Lady Menzies of Weem, entered into similar undertakings. In 1587, Rattray of Craighall binds himself, with his dependents, ‘to serve the said earl in all his actions and adoes, against all persons, the king’s majesty only excepted, and sall neither hear nor see his skaith, but sall make him foreseen therewith, and sall resist the same sae far as in me lies, and that in respect the said earl has given me his band of maintenance.’ The remaining bonds before 1593 are from the Earl of Orkney, Menzies of Pitfoddles, Lord Lovat, Menzies of that Ilk, Scott of Abbotshall, the Laird of Melgund, Mackintosh of Dunnachtan, Innes of Innermarky, Lord Spynie, Cameron of Locheil, the Clan Macpherson, sundry barons of Moray, and the Laird of Luss. We may thus see what a formidable person this Earl of Huntly was to the Protestant interest in the year last named, and what a problem it must have been to the pacific King James to give him effectual opposition, however well he had been so inclined.[244]

[Sidenote: 1600.]

The Marquis of Huntly chiefly dwelt in an ancient seat called Strathbogie Castle, situated where the rivulet Bogie joins the Doveran, near the village of Huntly, in Banffshire. He had another seat, called the Castle of the Bog or of Bogaugicht, on the extensive plain at the embouchure of the Spey, in the same county. The migrations of the family between the two places, and between them and a town-mansion in Aberdeen, are frequently alluded to by the annalist Spalding. In 1602, the marquis rebuilt Strathbogie Castle in a handsome style; and the remains of the house yet attest a grandness of living suitable to the wealth and political importance of the family. ‘A spacious turnpike-stair leads to what has been a very grand hall, and still bears the marks of splendour and magnificence. Its length is about forty-three feet, its breadth twenty-nine, and its height sixteen. There is another grand apartment over this, thirty-seven feet in length, and twenty-nine in breadth. The chimneys of both are highly ornamented with curious sculpture of various figures.... Most of the apartments are still in tolerable preservation, particularly the ceilings, which are ornamented with a great variety of paintings in small divisions, containing many emblematical figures, with verses expressive of some moral sentiment in doggerel rhyme.’[245]

* * * * *

[Sidenote: JULY 2.]

John Kincaid of Warriston, near Edinburgh, was married to a handsome young woman, named Jean Livingstone, daughter to a man of fortune and influence, the Laird of Dunipace. Owing to alleged maltreatment, the young wife conceived a deadly hatred of her husband. A base-minded nurse was near, to whisper means and ways of revenge, and the lady was induced to tamper with a young man named Robert Weir, a servant of her father, to become the instrument. At an early hour in the morning marginally noted, Weir came to Warriston, and, being admitted by the lady into the gentleman’s chamber, there fell upon him with his fists, and soon accomplished his death. While Weir fled, the lady remained at home, along with the nurse. Both were immediately seized, subjected to a summary kind of trial before the magistrates, and condemned to death.

[Sidenote: 1600.]

In the brief interval between the sentence and execution, this unfortunate young creature--she was only twenty-one--was brought, by the discourse of an amiable clergyman, from a state of callous indifference to one of lively sensibility and religious resignation. Her case was reported in a small pamphlet of the day. She stated that, on Weir assaulting her husband, she went to the hall, and waited till the deed was done. She thought she still heard the pitiful cries uttered by her husband while struggling with his murderer. Afterwards, by way of dissembling, she tried to weep; but not a tear could she shed. She could only regard her approaching death as a just expiation of her offence. Her relations, feeling shamed by her guilt and its consequences, made interest to obtain that her execution should be as little public as possible, and it was accordingly arranged that, while the nurse was being burnt on the Castle Hill at four in the morning, and thus attracting the attention of any who might be out of their beds, the lady should be conducted to the Girth Cross, at the opposite extremity of the city, and there despatched by the Maiden.

According to the contemporary pamphlet: ‘The whole way, as she went to the place of execution, she behaved herself so cheerfully, as if she had been going to her wedding, and not to her death. When she came to the scaffold, and was carried up upon it, she looked up to the Maiden with two longsome looks, for she had never seen it before. This I may say of her, to which all that saw her will bear record, that her only countenance moved [her countenance alone would have excited emotion], although she had not spoken a word. For there appeared such majesty in her countenance and visage, and such a heavenly courage in her gesture, that many said: “That woman is ravished with a higher spirit than man or woman’s!”’ After reading a short address to the multitude at the four corners of the scaffold, she calmly resigned herself to her fate, uttering expressions of devotion till the descent of the axe cut short her speech.

Weir, being taken four years after, was broken on the wheel (June 26, 1604), a severe death, scarcely ever before inflicted in Scotland.--_Pit._ _Bir._

* * * * *

[Sidenote: JULY 21.]

In Edinburgh, this day, ‘at nine hours at even, a combat or _tulyie_ [was fought] between twa brether of the Dempsters, and ane of them slain by John Wilson. [He], being tane with het bluid, was execute at the flesh-stocks, where he had slain the man the night before.’--_Bir._

[Sidenote: JULY 25.]

Quick as legal vengeance was in this instance, we have proof of its being of little avail for prevention of like outrages. Alexander Stewart, son of James Stewart of Allanton, had applied for admission to the king at Holyroodhouse, at a time ‘when his majesty desirit to be quiet,’ and Alexander Lockhart, one of the ushers of the chamber, had accordingly denied him admittance. The young man, conceiving deadly hatred at Lockhart for this, trained him out of his house unarmed, and there set upon him with sword and bended pistol to take his life. For a wonder, Lockhart escaped with only two wounds in the head. The guilty youth was denounced rebel for not answering for his offence.--_P. C. R._

* * * * *

[Sidenote: JULY.]

[Sidenote: 1600.]

The calamities of dearth, want, and a high mortality continued this year to press upon the people, in almost all parts of the country. ‘A sheaf of oat-straw was sold for forty shillings in Edinburgh. There was also a great death of little children; six or seven buried [in Edinburgh] in a day.’--_Cal._

In October, the pest was in the town of Findhorn, in consequence of which there was an edict of the Privy Council, charging all the people there and thereabouts to keep at home, lest they should spread the infection.--_P. C. R._ We find the magistrates of Aberdeen in December ordaining a fast ‘in respect of the fearful infection of the plague spread abroad in divers parts of Moray.’--_Ab. C. R._

* * * * *

‘The year of God 1600, fourteen whales, of huge bigness, were casten in by the sea, upon the sands under the town of Dornoch in Sutherland. They came in alive, and were slain immediately by the inhabitants, who reaped some commodity thereby. Some of these fishes were ninety feet in length.’--_G. H. S._

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[Sidenote: AUG. 5.]

In the midst of a time unmarked by great events, great excitement was caused by the attempt of the Earl of Gowrie and his brother upon the king’s liberty or life, at Perth. James Melville notes that ‘a little before or hard about the day of this accident, the sea at an instant, about low-water, debordit and ran up aboon the sea-mark, higher nor at any stream-tide, athort all the coast-side of Fife, and at an instant reteired again to almaist low-water, to the great admiration of all, and skaith done to some.’

[Sidenote: AUG. 6.]

While Robert Bruce and some others of the clergy professed to regard the conspiracy with incredulity, the great bulk of the people, going with their loyalty, as often happens, far beyond the merit of its object, manifested all tokens of extreme satisfaction at the king’s escape. On the arrival of the news, ‘there was sic joy, that the cannons shot, the bells rang, the trumpets sounded, the drums strake. The town rase in arms, with shooting of muskets, casting of fire-works, and banefires set forth; the like was never seen in Scotland, there was sic merriness and dancing all the nicht.’--_Bir._

The same day, the state-officers, with some other nobles, went to the Cross, ‘and there heard Mr David Lindsay make ane orison, and the haill people sat down on their knees, giving thanks to God for the king’s deliverance out of sic ane great danger.’--_Bir._

[Sidenote: AUG. 11.]

[Sidenote: 1600.]